|
meatcleaver -> RE: Communism & Socialism (10/15/2006 1:59:56 PM)
|
quote:
ORIGINAL: CrappyDom
Meatcleaver, you wrote the following:
quote:
I bet Bill Gates would have no problem getting young beautiful women, rich men rarely do, no matter what they look like. If we accept that one of the primal motives women have in looking for a man is for a man capable of providing, then rich men have what they want. We live in a society were muscular bodies don't count for a lot, we don't hunt mamoths anymore but hunt the dollar and that takes wit, resourcefulness and brains. Great if you've got all that and a great body but a great body is icing on the cake. Go to any financial centre, London, Paris, New York and you will see pretty average looking older men in restuarants with young pretty women.
I think (correct me if I am wrong) that you are pretty much way to the left of socialism? Anyway, I find it interesting that you post the above which to ME is why I have never believed that true communisim could ever work. Women are attracted to power/money and because of that men will always strive to have it.
I am curious what you think. I believe that there CAN be better systems but I think that whatever it is, it must reward in some way individual effort. One of the things I think would be interesting would be to ban inheritance completely. Gates got filthy rich on luck, brains, and shrewed skill and made a lot of people rich while he was at it. The kids though are never as good as the parents, so make them all compete on a somewhat equal field and throw that money back into the market.
My gut instincts are quite far to the left of centre but my brains and experience tells me it doesn't work and society has to be run with the grain of human nature to be successful. I was born and brought up in a very poor area and I didn't want to wait until government fixed things to make that area worth living in and if I did, I would still be waiting for government action so I'm not a great believer in the efficiency of government. However, I don't believe in greed being the only motivating factor in human activity either so raw capitalism isn't an answer for me either. I wish I had a simple answer such as socialism but having been a trade union activist and a member of the Labour Party when I was younger, I witnessed too much petty corruption in both organisations to have blind faith in politicians or unionists.
There has to be motivation for individuals to be active in society, whether that is entrepreneurial or through political and social activism, both are necessary. The only financial mechanism is through tax, price regulation has been tried and doesn't work, you either make things too expensive or too cheap and destroy parts of the economy elsewhere. The other problem is to do with social activism, the more people are educated and hence more likely to be active in society the less they want to do the crap jobs in society, yet society could cope better without doctors than workers at the local sewage plant. The nearest i've seen anything to working is in Denmark where top jobs such as Judges can only earn seven times that of the lowest paid workers (or did) but that doesn't work for business which is an international market.
As for banning inheritence tax, people will get rid of their money before they die or open trust funds or someother tax avoidence scheme. The government can only tax something so much before people start to look for loop holes in the tax system. I would prefer more of people's tax being collected locally and spent locally. This would encourage activism because people could have more control over how their taxes are spent. People would also see the benefits of those taxes and if they don't, they would be able to do something about it rather than just belly aching about central government while feeling inpotent. However, to do this and I'm talking about Britain now, the political system would have to be reformed to stop political parties and their ideologues hijacking the system. I've thought about this often and I think it can be done with a local civil service that is there as an advisary council for independents. The internal petty politicking of political parties means that many talented people that join them wanting to do something for their community, soon get disillusioned and leave. I sat through hours of meetings in my youth, totally frustrated by people who knew how the party worked more than those people who wanted to get things done but couldn't because of the points of order and party rules which ideologues used for their own engrandisement in their little fish bowl.
Damn, you've got me on a rant CD. But trying to be concise, I think the answer is bringing everything down to a local level that is possible. People who are active locally also take interest in national politics too on the whole.
|
|
|
|
