The end of private ownership in the means of production

Quote from Matt Houston:

Thanks, I'll take a look at the book. I hear you about redistribution, it's not ideal giving somebody/group the power to redistribute the fruits of labour of others but it's a necessary evil I suppose. I only recently learned that the first welfare state was not created by social democratic parties as I thought but by the Prussian head of state to prevent a worker revolution.

I don't know about the right to have offspring idea, you can't stop people having kids and you can't tell people that because they had kids they aren't going to get any support and let them starve to death.
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Genocide is the more humane option. The federal government already has plans in place.
 
Quote from MasterGambler:

None of your scenario's are correct. There are people in powerful places putting the final touches in place on a plague that will wipe out about 75% of the human population. It is a modified much more highly communicable form of Ebola.

That will bring things back into balance in the world. :D

The whole "meek shall inherit the earth" and half the things in the bible were to train people to be sheep. Sheep they shall be to the slaughter.

The poor shall die and the rich shall live on.
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I never understand this whole line of thinking that if only (fill in large percentage of the population here) were gone, things would be "in balance".

Think back to the time in history when there were 75% fewer humans than there are now. Were things "in balance"? No, they weren't. It's not the number of people that matter, it's the way we are hard-wired that makes "balance" impossible.
 
Quote from StarDust9182:

Some thoughts for you:

I believe that I read that every democracy has ended in facism with an average lifespan of about 200 years. Monetary debasement has led to the downfall of many (if not all) of them.

The biggest change was the movement off family farms into government dependence. It is not clear to me if it was intentional or not. Society is now dependent on political capital (worth even less than money). Your job loss society started there.

The internet gives the government a shot at the ultimate form of fascism, especially given the intelligence of the population. (The amount of intelligence is a constant, unfortunately, population increases constantly.

zeitgeist movie dot com (in particular moving forward) may be of interest to you.

I began to think about the end of jobs when I was making Printed Circuit Boards in the 1980s and observed the accelerating evolution of the electronic industry as I worked and thought about just what I was really doing for society. I moved into computers and saw the evolution continuing there much to my surprise. I think that much of today's problems ultimately stem from the movement off of family farms into modern city society.

I think a long term sustainable society lies in planet resource management and not creating better iphones. I have no idea how to get there, but I think we will not like the transition when we do get there.

Of course, I have been wrong before ....
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Zeitgeist? You mean like Venus project kind of stuff? I don't know where I stand with that, sounds very Utopian, Marxism with Robots maybe.

But yeah, I don't really have a boner for Capitalism or private property but I have concerns with collectivisation in who it is who gets to collectivise and who gets to decide how to distribute...know what I mean, 1984 type shit = ). Do I sound like a right wing nut job if I say something like "markets are the only way I know of to ensure individual liberty." I guess I have a bit of a Libertarian streak in me.

“It is probably true that business corrupts everything it touches. It corrupts politics, sports, literature, art, labour unions and so on. But business also corrupts and undermines monolithic totalitarianism. Capitalism is at its liberating best in a non-capitalist environment.” - Eric Hoffe

I read a book by Schumpeter called Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy where he comes to the same conclusion as us and this was back in the 40's, except oddly he doesn't even mention technology, he focus's on tenancy towards monopoly, the rise of the intellectual class and the depersonalisation of Capitalism, i.e. big faceless corporations.

That;s interesting re the family farms stuff.
 
Quote from morganist:

I reckon it is the end of any kind of benefit. They cannot pay it anymore. What will happen is there will be loads of people not eligi ble for anything wondering the streets, it is already happening. Eventually it will affect enough people to do something about it and the land owning rights will change. By then of there will be a huge loss of life and total poverty for up to thirty percent of the population.
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Yip I agree, eventually property rights will become a problem
 
Quote from logic_man:

I never understand this whole line of thinking that if only (fill in large percentage of the population here) were gone, things would be "in balance".

Think back to the time in history when there were 75% fewer humans than there are now. Were things "in balance"? No, they weren't. It's not the number of people that matter, it's the way we are hard-wired that makes "balance" impossible.
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Things are different now. The surviving population has advanced technology to make life easy.

Massive amounts of laborers to support the rich are not required.

If you think there will be any issue suppressing the poor just look at a country like Brazil, Indonesia, or especially India with it's caste system...
 
The outlier I see is that maybe technology might mean we don't even need the government to provide for us, maybe technology will become so cheap and advanced that every family will have a microwave sized nano-factory in their garage and a 3d printer which can make them whatever they need to survive. Who needs socialism?

Land will always be scarce of course, but that's my best outcome scenario, as unlikely as it may seem
:)
 
Quote from Matt Houston:

The outlier I see is that maybe technology might mean we don't even need the government to provide for us, maybe technology will become so cheap and advanced that every family will have a microwave sized nano-factory in their garage and a 3d printer which can make them whatever they need to survive.

Land will always be scarce of course, but that's my best outcome scenario, as unlikely as it may seem
:)
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The amount of human population on this planet is an exponential curve. It is a pyramid scheme. It is a bubble. It will burst. :cool:
 
Quote from MasterGambler:

The amount of human population on this planet is an exponential curve. It is a pyramid scheme. It is a bubble. It will burst. :cool:
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Yeah I know, the growth is already slowing.

On the issue of land being scarce, maybe some kind of land tax a la Georgism would be the answer (in the interim prior to the bubble burst.)
 
Quote from logic_man:

I never understand this whole line of thinking that if only (fill in large percentage of the population here) were gone, things would be "in balance".

Think back to the time in history when there were 75% fewer humans than there are now. Were things "in balance"? No, they weren't. It's not the number of people that matter, it's the way we are hard-wired that makes "balance" impossible.
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Great comment. It think it's mostly the unbalanced that suggest these kinds of solutions.

It truly amazes me that some actually think that they are glad if the money system fails or there is a massive destruction, or some other suggested fix. A subsection of the NIMBY philosophy I guess.

The solution comes when people change, not when circumstances change. We are all in this together whether we like it or not and whether we realize it or not.

Compassion is a vital survival skill.
 
Quote from Matt Houston:

........ Who needs socialism? ......
:)
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The government does. (All of us need some kind of identity or purpose). Common people can't eat, breathe or wear socialism.
 
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