With the greatest respect, Maximillion, those are entirely different questions.

>>Do you consider it "democratic" that a Packer or a Murdoch can "earn" millions, and pay less than 5cents on the dollar taxation, while we mere serfs must pay 20-30%? Many of the legal profession pay NOTHING! Doctors can get away paying on average 7cents per, and so on and so on...Can you explain or justify that?<<

You may as well ask whether it is "democratic" that a son is allowed to inherit his father's business fortune. To some, it is a basic right, to be able to dispose of one's property as one thinks fit. To others, property is theft.

As I said before, confusing ideology ("wouldn't it be nice if we shared everything") with reality, is pretty pointless. I can intellectually agree with your ideology as much as I like, but if its implementation means that my family will starve, then I'm sorry, I'm agin' it.

The absolute, stark reality is that if we shared the wealth of the world equally, you and I would be scratching out a living growing vegetables. Nobody could afford to build a plasma TV, or a car, or a mobile phone - there simply wouldn't be enough spare cash with which to start a business that would do this, let alone enough customers with the money to buy the stuff.

So it is important, for our own survival, to live in the world of the possible, and not in the world of "wouldn't it be nice if..."

>>Pericles, you are demonstrating the "Government as a business" model...<<

Not at all, Maximillion. I merely mentioned government in its role as a parasite on the bum of business, leeching off the workers to keep its favoured few in comfy superannualtion. Believe me, government would ban all private business enterprises in a New York minute, if it could.

Fortunately for all of us, it can't. But it certainly has a good solid stab at making it fiendishly difficult.

mikk, I'd hate for this to turn into an Economics 101 seminar, because that would be boring for all of us, including me.

But you miss the entire point when you say:

>>It would never even cross the capitalists greedy little minds to reduce profits now would it? Its always wages that have to go down.<<

If you reduce profits, your share price goes down. If your share price goes down, your Bank might decide you are no longer a good risk, and call in its loans. At the very least, it would increase your interest payments, which would squeeze your profits even further. This would make you a takeover target, and usually what happens in a takeover is that a ton of people lose their jobs.

Another of the impacts of reducing profits is that the government will get less in taxes. There are two possible reactions to this: increase taxes to make up for the shortfall, or get rid of a ton of public servants.

I know which one of those I favour. But that's just me.

Running a business is just a little harder than you seem to believe that it is.

First, it takes capital. If the returns on that capital are low (i.e. we implement the mikk "low profits" plan), then you won't find anyone willing to invest in the business. If no-one invests in the business, then no-one gets a job of any kind, forget about a well-paid one.

Then there is the permanent battle to stay relevant to your customers, which usually means that you have i) a good product ii) at a good price that is iii) well-known to your customers. So it goes without saying that you also need iv) great, well-motivated, properly-rewarded people.

I know that it might be difficult for you to believe mikk, but all this requires management skills, that stretch beyond a nine-to-five, pipe-and-slippers lifestyle.

All businesses live on a daily knife-edge, kept afloat - not by socialist rhetoric, but by the normal desires and aspirations of ordinary human beings.

Pericles, I have no objection to inheritance, merely the inequality of a tax system that bleeds the average citizen while rewarding those who need it least, and that’s the root of my question about its democratic credentials.
You again use the business model to couch your reply, and, as stated, within its confines you are right, to a large degree, I do not dispute that.
I said nothing however about sharing the wealth equally.
To answer you on wealth though, yes, capitalism has brought us to this point, agreed, but does that mean we must keep it forever? We’ve outgrown many things, why not that?
Given our global interconnectedness, and our computer technology, why not scrap the entire idea of “money” completely? Why have a medium of exchange at all? We could easily still organize our world to provide for all, and without the greed and suffering that has been its hallmark to date.
With education and health available to all, it’s not beyond our ability to design a social system that promotes research, development, and production/distribution to all.
To my mind, we lost our future when the system decided that profit wasn’t enough, profit-growth, every single year, had to be the goal. Nothing can grow forever without destroying/consuming something else, in this case, our happiness basically.
What is so wrong about making a reasonable profit and keeping the cost to the consumer low? Growth in profit must, by definition, lead to increasing prices, and wages to cover them, an endless destructive cycle, to my way of thinking.

It would never even cross the capitalists greedy little minds to reduce profits now would it? Its always wages that have to go down.

Well Mikk, this is not quite correct. Everyone assumes that businesses make a fortune and in some cases they may appear to, however people look at big business and all they focus on is the millions or billions in profits, they have little or no consideration for the capital outlay involved in making those profits.

Wages over the past decade have risin. Why then can't business profits rise by the same percentage, or this this just not fair in your view.

Another huge impost on business is compliance costs. These costs have gone through the roof in recent times. My public liability insurance cover has gone from 1 Million 20 years ago to 20 million today. Work cover is another.

Perhaps tax overhauling may be the answer.

Maximillion, as I have mentioned, there's nothing wrong with idealism. But it needs to be kept in perspective, when trying to deal with real-world problems.

The vast majority of people live very simple lives; they get up, go to work, collect their pay, drive the kids to soccer on a Saturday and visit the mother-in-law on Sunday. To suggest that next week, they should get by without money would be a little challenging, to say the least.

But let's assume for a moment that we have "outgrown" capitalism. You clearly would like to see it destroyed, as have many before you. But like them, you have nothing to offer as a replacement.

Try to imagine for a moment what you are asking those ordinary families to do.

>>...why not scrap the entire idea of “money” completely? Why have a medium of exchange at all? We could easily still organize our world to provide for all, and without the greed and suffering that has been its hallmark to date. With education and health available to all, it’s not beyond our ability to design a social system that promotes research, development, and production/distribution to all.<<

Sadly, for your vision at least, it will not be easy to replace money. After all, it was developed to simplify the exchange of goods and services, and does exactly that, for most people. It is easy to understand and convenient to use.

And it is worth pointing out that the "education and health available to all" that you mention is in fact based upon the exchange of individual skills and capabilities (teachers, nurses etc.) for a living wage. And the tools of their trade (schools, hospitals, pharmaceuticals) require capital investment, which also needs some form of exchange mechanism in order for it to work.

Money will be with us for a while yet. Get used to it.

There's no harm in imagining Utopia, Maximillion, it is a healthy and valuable activity. But don't allow those dreams to overlap too much with your daily life, as they are liable to distract you from the really important stuff.

Basically what you've said is we need money because we have money, a mobius argument.
You define everything as an exchange, that's the basis of capitalism, but why not define it as just giving? You say getting by without money would be a challenge for families, but why? Food would be available, power and water too, and everything else. You would have no need to pay for anything, so why would it be difficult?
"Sadly, for your vision at least, it will not be easy to replace money. After all, it was developed to simplify the exchange of goods and services, and does exactly that, for most people. It is easy to understand and convenient to use."
Again, "exchange", and again, I ask, why? Is it so hard to see a society that just gives? I give, you give, everyone gives, and all enjoy the fruits of that giving? If we rejected everything that was "too hard" to do, we'd not be where we are now.
Offer nothing to replace it? I thought I had, an egalitarian, giving society, with true justice, doesn't seem too bad an idea to me.
Your supercilious response belittles you, try explaining why the system is good rather than sneering at my "Idealism", show how this current system is so wonderful for the starving millions of the world, instead of just declaring that it must be this way because it's always been this way. That has a familiar ring to it, we would still be living in a Feudal, violent world if that attitude hadn't been fought and conquered.
And as for your final comment, what utter rubbish, and you embarrass yourself. You have my pity, what a horrid grey world you must live in.