Poll: Capitalism dying?

[WorkingClassBro]

My personal answer to this question is yes. Capitalism won't be able to sustain its own contradictions and will fall to its own technological progress.

What do you think?

[Prince of Salem]

Abstain (normal).

[ElectionsGuy]

No, its the only economic system that has proven to be successful over time.

My personal answer to this question is yes. Capitalism won't be able to sustain its own contradictions and will fall to its own technological progress.

What do you think?

What contradictions are you talking about here?

[Gustaf]

Capitalism is more a slur than a well-defined economic term, but going on what I suspect this question is about the reasonable answer is no (ignoring also the silly aspect of "sooner or later" - sooner or later the Earth will probably merge into the Sun but I don't think that's what he means)

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

The myth of a free market is such a fraud, but I imagine mixed economies will dominate in the future.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Capitalism will die sooner or later, but what replaces it depends on how the death of unskilled labor is handled and how we respond to environmental concerns.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I note that 'WorkingClassBro' is repeating one of Marx's more hilariously wrong predictions.

Capitalism is more a slur than a well-defined economic term

It's useful as an economic-term-in-historical-perspective because it isn't as though there's another word lying around to be used, and as new jargon is invariably terrible.

[Person Man]

Capitalism will die sooner or later, but what replaces it depends on how the death of unskilled labor is handled and how we respond to environmental concerns.

That was a winded article, but the jist is pretty simple. There could eventually be a techno-political solution (capitalism will evolve by having the market becoming a more tangible thing than just a way to quantify providence) , a technological solution (finally all the experiments with medicine, space travel, clean energy and artificial intelligence will be successful and things will just materialize) or no solution to our problems (if you can't afford to live , you don't live).

The most realistic situation probably goes between 1 and 3.

[Roemerista]

Capitalism won't be able to sustain its own contradictions and will fall to its own technological progress.

Someone just read some Schumpeter.

I think not, the future of capitalism is that we are all capitalists.

[Flake]

If capitalism dies, mankind's ability to progress will die.

Not certainly, but capitalism has lead to a lot of competition in order to get a better, cheaper product and that's where the driving force for a lot of innovation in technology comes from. In this system, which there are a lot of flaws, it has worked better than our friends in the USSR and Cuba.

I think it would be best to continue to have a mixed market system, where some things are controlled by the government (schools, police), and others not controlled by the government (businesses) but needs to pay their fair share so everybody can prosper. Almost the current system we have now.

[The Mikado]

My personal answer to this question is yes. Capitalism won't be able to sustain its own contradictions and will fall to its own technological progress.

What do you think?

How's your Internet quality there in 1870?

[Mechaman]

Capitalism is fake and gay.

[Grumpier Than Thou]

Don't get my hopes up.

[Blue3]

No... until we reach post-scarcity through technological progress.



But also, no country has even been "purely capitalist," it's important to point out. So if you define capitalism dying out as no longer having pure capitalism... we never had pure capitalism to begin with. If you define capitalism dying out as not even a strand of capitalism surviving... as long as human nature exists, some form of capitalism will survive.

[Hatman 🍁]

Well, the inherent desire for humans to trade things will never die. The sooner we socialists realise that, the better we can mold our policies to best regulate that desire.

[muon2]

Capitalism will die sooner or later, but what replaces it depends on how the death of unskilled labor is handled and how we respond to environmental concerns.

The article goes into depth on four rather extreme outcomes, but lacks discussion as to how the current market economies might evolve to those outcomes. Market economies in practice are tied to the political powers, and the pathway for one to evolve requires thought about how the political structure would react. The author partly recognizes this in his discussion that there were ideas that could have addressed the USSR's failure but for the technical and political obstacles. Even though technology evolves, the political structures may not.

To the OP, technology may alter the traditional role of labor, but one's time remains a fixed commodity, so I expect that some sort of market could remain for that aspect of "labor". Similarly technology might alleviate the scarcity of many things, but things like land will be inherently fixed despite technology. If market economies remain for the management of fixed or scarce resources, then at least some elements of capitalism will survive.

[Gustaf]

I note that 'WorkingClassBro' is repeating one of Marx's more hilariously wrong predictions.

Capitalism is more a slur than a well-defined economic term

It's useful as an economic-term-in-historical-perspective because it isn't as though there's another word lying around to be used, and as new jargon is invariably terrible.

I like market economy, that's a term which I understand the definition of. Whenever people talk about capitalism they're usually being very political and very emotional and I'm not sure EXACTLY what it means. It seems to often be something like "United Fruits shooting union members in Latin America"

[The Mikado]

I think capitalism is a useful term for contrasting with pre-capitalist economic models from the 17th-18th century.  Certainly it is clear that there is a distinct and fundamental difference between the so-called mercantilist economies of the 18th century and the so-called capitalist ones of the 19th, even if you don't think that "mercantilism" was ever a real economic ideology and that "capitalism" was a nebulous, meaningless term.

[Rockefeller GOP]

If capitalism dies, mankind's ability to progress will die.

[Cory]

Capitalism is much more efficient than a mixed market system. The only reason we can have a mixed market system is because pure capitalism created enough wealth for all of these safety nets. Capitalism literally has no flaws.

*NUCLEAR FACEPALM*

[Rockefeller GOP]

Capitalism is much more efficient than a mixed market system. The only reason we can have a mixed market system is because pure capitalism created enough wealth for all of these safety nets. Capitalism literally has no flaws.

*NUCLEAR FACEPALM*

Name me the flaws

Some people are poor!  (Joking because that's clearly not a flaw)

[Blue3]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_failure

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

I note that 'WorkingClassBro' is repeating one of Marx's more hilariously wrong predictions.

Capitalism is more a slur than a well-defined economic term

It's useful as an economic-term-in-historical-perspective because it isn't as though there's another word lying around to be used, and as new jargon is invariably terrible.

I like market economy, that's a term which I understand the definition of. Whenever people talk about capitalism they're usually being very political and very emotional and I'm not sure EXACTLY what it means. It seems to often be something like "United Fruits shooting union members in Latin America"

Political economy is a political subject. Any descriptive term used for the positive analysis of economic systems will inevitably be used to make normative claims. I am not exactly sure what defines a market economy, which is a term that strikes me as a shibboleth for those on the right.

It's certainly true that capitalism is an obsolete term that only has a clear meaning when we're talking about the 19th or early 20th century. Political economy was pretty cut and dry then: the only industrialized nations with functioning markets in all arenas of life were characterized by nightwatchman states. Now the most meaningful questions of political economy are not centered upon deciding whether or not markets should exist but rather what values markets should embody. Even radical Marxists agree that markets should exist: their argument is that computing power should facilitate capital flows or that worker-owned firms should be responsible for the decisions made by "capitalists".  The idea of the "command economy" is defunct.

I agree that capitalism is a defunct firm from a different era but all substitutes for the term are heavily politicized. For instance, I think that "neo-liberalism" or "late capitalism" are very descriptive and useful terms but that they've been ruined because they've been used pejoratively by activists.

[© tweed]

since there have been laws, there have been criminals
there have been thieves since there’s been property
and the day will come again when none of those things are around; i just hope it’s before people go extinct

[Franzl]

If capitalism dies, mankind's ability to progress will die.

Not certainly, but capitalism has lead to a lot of competition in order to get a better, cheaper product and that's where the driving force for a lot of innovation in technology comes from. In this system, which there are a lot of flaws, it has worked better than our friends in the USSR and Cuba.

I think it would be best to continue to have a mixed market system, where some things are controlled by the government (schools, police), and others not controlled by the government (businesses) but needs to pay their fair share so everybody can prosper. Almost the current system we have now.

Capitalism is much more efficient than a mixed market system. The only reason we can have a mixed market system is because pure capitalism created enough wealth for all of these safety nets. Capitalism literally has no flaws.

I can see the argument that it's the best system we've come up with...but no flaws? LOL