Re: Socialism and Capitalism

Alex Russell wrote:

> Fred wrote:
>> Topaz wrote:
>> 
>>> On Mon, 21 Jul 2008 21:25:45 -0400, Fred <fred@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>>        No people are doing work without whips and chains, and after
>>>>        capitalism
>>>> they still will work.  Why wouldn't they?
>>>   They wouldn't if they didn't need money to buy things.
>>>
>>         The new system is not based on money as a scarce commodity. 
You
>>         buy things
>> by issuing money, but most people arecapable of understanding that they
>> still need "things" and somebody has to make them.  It would be
>> the "things" (goods and services), that people would have to relate to
>> instead of the money.  People can do this.  We have brains.
>> 
>> 
> 
> So basically you loan yourself the 'money' by promising to pay it back
> later.
> 
        No,  at least no more than we do now with scarce money.  What
you're really
doing is *issuing* the money.  But the money is not a representation of
goods and services but rather only a measure of goods and services,...
(That "keeping track of value" function you refer to below).

> How do you prevent freeloaders and other gaming of your system?
> 
        Everybody wonders about that.  Firstly the system is so robust
that a few
freeloaders don't bother it.  [Everybody needs a vacation from time to
time, (:-)) ]
        The other thing to remember is that freeloaders are people who
take more
out of the system than they put in.  Fine.  Look at the rich people we
have
now in *this* scarce money system.  By definition they wouldn't have
become
rich if they hadn't taken more out then they put in.  That's what getting
rich means.  If you're going to criticise the new system for letting that
happen, you have to realise that our current system also allows it and we
practically wor****p these people and envy them.  It's the basic objective
of the system, to get rich.
        Over and above that, even when someone abuses the new system and
takes out
more than they put in, their wealth will be obvious and their account
balance, which is in the public record, will show what they are doing, and
what they continue to do.  The community will have a chance to deal with
the problem.  Also, and this is the advantage, under our system those who
get rich have power over the rest of us through the power of their money. 
Under the new system, if they abuse it and take more out of the system,
their account is negative.  They don't have money *and* even if they did,
everybody else still has their own purchasing power and the money cannot
be
used to influence them.  It's merely a record of value, not a
representation of true wealth.  That is why I say this kind of money is
much more democratic than what we have now.
        True, people can abuse the system for a while, but it's up to the
general
public to look at what they're doing.  Why sell a house to someone who
already has a nice house when there are other people homeless?  Most
people
will learn the dynamics of the new system and it's im****tant that they do
before it's adopted.  There's a lot of education that needs to go on
before
we jump in with both feet.  The dynamics of the system are totally
different and the strategies are different also.

> Rational people already value goods, services, labour, art and other
> things and ideas and use money as a convenient way of keeping track of
> value. Much easier than barter.
> 
        The current system does much more than that, and rational people
are
conditioned to accept it without thinking about the problems.  When money
can make more money, then the rich will get richer and the poor will stay
poor and the middle class will get poorer too because they don't invest as
much as the rich.  As a greater amount of the wealth of the planet is
concentrated in the hands of fewer and fewer people it stresses the
economy
and other people starve.  The rich want to maintain their profit levels
and
resort to new and more extreme methods of making money; influencing
governments, starting wars, etc.  Eventually the whole system collapses
and
we're seeing this happen in the news every day, bit by bit.
        The system is unstable and eventually destroys itself.  That is
why empires
fall!  The new system of plentiful money is not only much more democratic,
but it is also stable and not self destructive.  It does require constant
care-taking to prevent large scale abuse, but at least it doesn't reward
the abuse with even greater power over other people.  It's a major step
forward.

-- 
Peace,
Fred
(Remove FFFf from my email address to reply by email).