Philosophy Now Forum

In a prior thread, I attacked Capitalism... my failure
in that thread was to assume that others understood
Capitalism as I did.. my bad.. so to correct this and move
my case along, I am revisiting Capitalism, as a system..
now is this really how I want to spend my time? not really,
but as others avoid homework, I shall provide them and you
with some basics about capitalism and what it means to you...

the basic and unavoidable point of Capitalism is the basic
drive for Capitalism.. that is the drive for profits....
if you don't accept this, you don't accept or understand
capitalism... there is no other point in capitalism outside
of profits.. as I hope to demonstrate.....

my critique of capitalism is nothing more than a repeat of
everything that Marx/Engles said about Capitalism...
and to this day, the single best critique of Capitalism
still lies within the critique of Marx/Engles...

One of my basic points of contention with capitalism is that
capitalism is nihilistic... and nihilism as I have described it is...

Nihilism: the negation of human beings and their values....

so the point of capitalism is the pursuit of profits... all other
values are subsumed within this pursuit of profits...

so to be clear and have some base understanding of Capitalism,
I have borrowed from Wiki to have a common point of view...

and wiki says this about capitalism:

Capitalism: ''Capitalism is an economic system based on the private
ownership of the means of production and their operation for profits"

so what is the point of capitalism? some might say to gain products
and services that might otherwise be unavailable....and has admirable
as that goal seems to be, it neglects to mention that the entire point
of capitalism is the search for profits..

and let us flesh out that point...every single person engaged in
the ownership of the means of production must engaged in
the search for profits... for it is profits that allow a business to
remain open...no profits, no business...think of your own
personal finances.. you have to make more money than you spend...
what happens if you don't make more money than you spend?
bankruptcy might be one result of that action... or you go broke...
and maybe not declare bankruptcy, but other bad things happen
like becoming homeless.. (the average American is just two
paychecks from being in dire financial trouble)

so the business, whatever business, must make profits to continue
to be in business...and how do business make profits? and here
come the nitty gritty of capitalism... you have expenses,
and one of those expenses is labor... in fact, for most businesses,
the highest cost within expenses is labor... and labor is the
most flexible aspect of business... you can't cut down on most
cost like rent, or insurance or taxes, or materials... those costs
for the most part are fixed...and so it is within labor that we can
cut cost and make profits...

and what is labor? Labor is the person who sells themselves to
a business for a wage/salary...( for those who believe that labor
is voluntary, I will work out that point later)

so how exactly does this labor aspect work? I am paid a certain amount
of money per hour, week, month.. on some amount offered by
the business... and this is an important point, the labor doesn't say,
pay me X amount of dollars, the business says, this is the going rate,
and I might be a little flexible, but not by much...salaries
and hourly rates are mostly fixed... at every job I have ever
had over these 45 years has been fixed by the employer,
not the employee... and how does a business work out
what is the rate of employment? let us make this math simple,
I am offered a job at 10 bucks an hour... and to make a profit,
the business must sell my production or my work for more
than they pay me... so, I make sandwiches, at 10 bucks an hour
the business must sell my sandwiches for more than what they pay me...
that is the only way to make a profit...so in my hour, I make 10 sandwiches..
my cost is fixed...10 dollars an hour, so the business sells the sandwiches
I made for 10 bucks, for an overall price more than 10 dollars...
If I make 10 dollars and the business sells the sandwich for
10 dollars, there is no profit.. and we haven't even included
the other fixed cost of rent, supplies, taxes, advertising...
so, to make a profit, the business must sell those sandwiches
at a greater price than the combined cost of the sandwiches...
and as labor is the highest cost in a business, that is
the cost that business can fix...so by paying it employees
a lessor rate than they created, I make $10 and the business
sells my work for more than that and again, to make the math
simple, let us say, that the business sells my effort for $20...
and that is for every hour, I work, the business gains $10 profits...
so at the end of the day, 8 hours, and I work at $10
and the business sells my effort at $20 dollars, so over an 8 hour
period, I am being paid $80 dollars... and the business makes over,
an 8 hour period... $160... or double of what it paid me....
again, this is a simplistic understanding of exactly what happens,
but it is in essence, a correct understanding...

to survive the business, whatever business that maybe, must
sell the cost of the product, whatever that product is,
more than the cost of making or buying that product..
if something cost $10 dollars, it must be sold for over that cost,
$10... or there won't be any profits...
and the greater the difference between the making or creating
that product, and selling that product, it is an increase in profits...
if you can sell those products at $30 dollars, then you have made
an even greater profits...

Now think about this... if you have just one person creating profits
by the difference between what you pay then and what you can
sell their efforts, you have made profits...
so if you have 10 people with a set cost of $10 dollars wages,
and that is $100 dollars and you can sell those products at
$20 dollars, you have made $200 dollars.. again minus other costs...

but that is the way to gain wealth... to have as many people as possible
making profits for you by selling their efforts for more than you
pay them...and every salary/wage paid for, can provide even
greater profits...

so a couple of points is quite clear, if you can keep wages/salaries low,
you can increase your profits... again the maker of profits is the difference
between what you pay people and what you sell their efforts for,
the greater the difference, the greater the profits...

and the second point that becomes clear is that the entire point
of business is to increase profits by any means necessary and the
easiest way to make profits is to increase the difference between
the work used to create the products and what those products
can be sold for.... thus we now get why businesses love
cheap labor... it allows them to have greater profits...
and why it is in the best interest of business to have a large
supply of labor available.. in other words, businesses love
it when there is an unemployment... it creates a large worker
base upon which you can demand that if they want a job,
they must take less money in order to have a job...
the more available workers, the lower the cost to employee
them... they will accept lower wages/salaries to work...
and this is why businesses hate full employment.. it forces
business to hire people at a greater wages... the fewer workers available
means that you have to pay more to get workers into the door..
and this is basic supply and demand.. the supply drives the prices
of the demands...more of something means the cost will go down to
allow it to compete.. and the less of something forces the price to go up...

now as I have mentioned, I have worked for over 45 years now,
and I haven't, yet, to have a job where the owner/boss hasn't
threaten me with being fired if I don't make profits...
if there are a lot of available workers out there, I can be
easily replaced by someone who will work for less money...
and business depends on that as a means to keep labor costs down...
thus increasing profits....

but another point becomes apparent and here is where I am arguing
about the nihilistic value of capitalism.... as a worker, I am quite
replaceable, I am expendable...and business operate with that
fact in mind... I am expendable... because my value as a worker
is less then the need to make profits.. I become a means to make
profits.. profits has more value to a business than workers do..
we are expendable....at a job once, I asked for a raised and
the owner said, he would rather fire me and hire three more
people because of my wage... he could hire three people
for what he was paying me.... and that is the exact mind set
that I am attacking... people have no value other than making
profits... they are a means to an end... and once my value
is below making any profits, I have no value to the business...
I am fired... for the essential aspect of business is to make
profits, not in any, way, shape or form about the employee..
the employees are expendable.. with only having value if,
if we make profits... we have no other value..
this is pure nihilism... negating people and their values....
in this case negating people for the profits they can make...

and so ends part one...

Kropotkin

Peter Kropotkin wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 5:41 pm
and so ends part one...

Kropotkin

You could have said all that in one paragraph, which is plenty when what you are actually saying is self evident anyway: In order to make a profit, your income has to exceed your expenses, and employers care more about making money than they do about their employees.

You say this is part one, which implies a threat of there being a part two, in which case I strongly urge you to make it much shorter, and write it in a style suitable for adults, rather than five year olds.

Thank you, comrade Kropotkin.


Kropotkin Kropotkin Kropotkin Kropotkin

and we reach the next phase of my explanation of capitalism...

capitalism operates within an certain environment..
and different states, regions, countries has different
operating processes...the basic idea is to make profits,
but within different state, they have to adjust
how they make profits... for example, here in California
we don't have the same laws as say, Mississippi, which
has an evil law, the right work law...you can fire any employee
for any reason on a right to work state, whereas in California,
you have to at least pretend to have a reason...
that difference forces companies to operate differently in
different environments...so a company must change it procedures
in Mississippi then what it does in California because of local
or state laws....it is not a monolithic process within all businesses...
businesses must change to adapt to the different procedures
within different states...but the final point is to make profits
and that goal doesn't change... just the way to make profits
change based on the different procedures in different states...

so worldwide, the goal of business is to make profits..
but the exact method changes depending on the state,
country or environment the business works in...
so in Africa, the same basic goal exists, to make profits,
but because Africa is a widely different place, with
54 countries doing 54 different things, the process or
procedure within each country changes...but the overall
goal remains the same... to make a profit.. just how
they go about it, changes...
this explains the apparent differences between African capitalism
and American capitalism... different environments create different
procedures and processes....what works in the U.S for capitalism
probably won't work in any specific country in Africa...because
of the difference between the two...
depending on the work ethic, what might work in one country,
may not work in another country... differences like that...

but the overall goal in both, Africa and America is to make
profits in business... the way they go about it may be different..
but the goal remains the same....to make profits at all costs....
remember, no profits.. no business....

now we come to a common argument about capitalism..
that the workers are voluntary workers.. not true...
if every single business operates with the idea that
the most important goal is profits, as they must,
then they must "use" workers.. if workers don't make
profits, they will be fired...and as every single business in
America uses this basic principle, the fact is that
A. working is a necessity... unless one is independently
wealthy, one must work... and that is the 99%
of us...

we have no choices in terms of having to work in companies
that operate within the capitalistic system of making profits...
all companies, unless they are a nonprofit, must make profits
to go on... and thus we are forced into a situation where
we must create profits or be fired...in every situation we
can work, we are, by necessity, forced into a situation where
where we are expendable... we are the means by which
companies make money/profits.. and the profits come first
the workers a very distant second.. at best....
and as I mentioned, by putting profits before people,
that is devaluing people.. that is nihilism...
the act of devaluing people and their values... which is
the very essence of capitalism...

there is no such thing as working voluntarily.... because
every single business operates the exact same way..
it must put profits before workers.. no profits, no business...
every single business operates the exact same way by
putting profits before workers...and any business that says
otherwise is lying... no profits...no business....

thus we are forced into working in capitalism that negates,
devalues us as human beings and negates and devalues
our values....
for example, take certain values that we hold to be dear...
for example, love... love has no value in the business world
because it doesn't make profits...take hope, it has no
value within the business world...or take honesty, one
must be honest with the business or be fired, but
honestly toward the customers, not so much....

and take cheating and lying... both values are valued within
the business world.. as they are values which can create profits
with its customers... or take freedom.... we are vastly limited
in our actions within the company... for example, as a checker
in a grocery store.. I am told how to dress, where to stand,
what to say, what procedures to follow... I have virtually
no ability to act independently within the store...
I have no freedom to act independently... I must follow
the correct procedures or be fired... and this lack of freedom
exists within all businesses... all employees must act within
a certain set of guidelines or be fired... now some guidelines
are more limited than other guidelines, but that doesn't mean
that there is freedom to act.. there isn't... I must follow
the correct procedures in every single business or be fired...
there is no freedom within the business world...
the only goal is to make profits.. and that is the only
guideline most businesses follow... and anything that threatens
profits, is removed, eliminated or fired...no exceptions....

and where is the freedom in that?

thus showing that the values we operate under are dismissed
in business.... and that creates the situation I am talking about..
if human beings are devalued, negated within business,
doesn't that create a overall nihilism within the society itself?

we are valued as human beings by our ability to create profits..
see the magazines that put the "so called" business leaders on
the covers... Musk for example... that they create profits,
increase the GDP, they have value within a society/state...
what if you don't create profits, what value do you have
within a society/state?

let us look at the so called "welfare state" here in America...
people who are on welfare or some sort of program
like social security, are devalued... if you don't work,
make profits, you are deemed to be of no value to a society/state...
you are considerd to be a "leach" on the society/state if you
don't work...thus the hatred to the so called "welfare queen"
a species that doesn't actually exists, but anyway...
if you are not working, you are devalued as a human being....
and if one is devalued as a human being, what is the point
of being in a society/state that has no use for you?

in other words, people often wonder about those who can
kill or steal from people or the state? they have been
devalued as human beings... no work, no value...
and thus from their standpoint, they have already been
devalued... they can't go any lower... so, what is the difference
in killing others and/or stealing or beating up someone if,
if you are already deemed to be of no value? our very actions
in devaluing people in turn allows those same people to
act as devalued people... if you have nothing and are nothing,
then what does it matter to kill or steal or beat someone up?
you already have no value...your actions have no value anyway...
why not act this way... the society/state has already denied your
value, why should you respect that same society/state?

the amount of violence in America shows us how many
people have been devalued/negated by the American system...
and the violence that the society/state has created cannot come
as a shock... if you devalue others, why should you expect them
to play nice and obey the rules?
the only path to recover our society/state is by
returning those millions of people into being part
of the society/state... into being of value to the
society/state... until we return people into
having value, they have no incentive to be part of
or obey the rules of society/the state....
and this situation will get worse because we are now
devaluing, negating more and more and more people....
not only are we devaluing non-workers, but we are devaluing
gays, trans people, liberals, minorities... by our words
and by our actions... until we return people into
being part of our society/state, we shall be falling apart
as a society/state... and that falling apart gains speed
and momentum... as we deny and devalue others...
the society is falling apart because we deny and devalue others..
and why should they pretend to be a part of a society that has
already devalued, negated them?
to negate others is to bring about more and more chaos
and disturbances into our society/state...

to negate gays or trans people, is to bring about a greater
amount of chaos into our society/state... it is as simple
as that... want a safer society/state?

to stop our nihilism in our society/state by not negating
others, non-workers, gay, trans, minorities, the poor,
people of color... once we begin to end this
negation and devaluing of others, we shall begin
the process of healing the state/society... we can
become a stronger, safer, better society/state by
accepting others and not by negating, devaluing others....

and that is what is wrong with capitalism.. it is another
example of how a society/state negates, denies
people and their values...the path to a better society/state
is by ending the nihilism of capitalism...

Kropotkin

Damn you, Kropotkin.

Harbal wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 6:39 pm

Peter Kropotkin wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 5:41 pm
and so ends part one...

Kropotkin

You could have said all that in one paragraph, which is plenty when what you are actually saying is self evident anyway: In order to make a profit, your income has to exceed your expenses, and employers care more about making money than they do about their employees.

You say this is part one, which implies a threat of there being a part two, in which case I strongly urge you to make it much shorter, and write it in a style suitable for adults, rather than five year olds.

Thank you, comrade Kropotkin.


Kropotkin Kropotkin Kropotkin Kropotkin

K: I write for my audience and in this case, it is a rather slow
and uninformed audience... so I write down to this audience..
if I had a faster more educated audience, I would write
differently...this is situational writing.. I write to meet
the audience needs, not mine...

Kropotkin

Peter Kropotkin wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 6:57 pm
K: I write for my audience and in this case, it is a rather slow
and uninformed audience... so I write down to this audience..
if I had a faster more educated audience, I would write
differently...this is situational writing.. I write to meet
the audience needs, not mine...

What on earth has lead you to believe you have an audience?

Harbal wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 7:06 pm

Peter Kropotkin wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 6:57 pm
K: I write for my audience and in this case, it is a rather slow
and uninformed audience... so I write down to this audience..
if I had a faster more educated audience, I would write
differently...this is situational writing.. I write to meet
the audience needs, not mine...

What on earth has lead you to believe you have an audience?

K: as you are reading me, I have an audience of one...
and as others are reading me, I have them as an audience...
anyone who reads me, is an audience...

Kropotkin

and to return to Marx...
one of the many points that Marx brought to notice is
this, that within Capitalism is that within capitalism
two point come about, one, that inevitably,
the money winds up in the hands of very few people
and the current situation of the vast amount of wealth
in the world is in the hands of very few...500 people
own as much wealth as half the world's population....
and the second point is that because of capitalism,
nature... it has vast fluctuations.. it goes very high
and then very low.... it is inherently unstable...
and it will increase the high and lows as time goes by...
and we see this...... about every 10 years or so, we
get a vast low in terms of the economy...
in 2008, we got one of the worst economic situations
we seen in a long while, and then in 2020, we got an
economic collapse that match the great depression...
and no matter what we do, assuming we keep capitalism,
we will have another economic collapse within a few years,
more likely about 6 or 7 years from now...
and the speed of these economic collapses will increase
over time... as predicted by Marx... and it won't change until
we revamp or eliminate capitalism...

Kropotkin

Peter Kropotkin wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 7:08 pm

K: as you are reading me, I have an audience of one...
and as others are reading me, I have them as an audience...
anyone who reads me, is an audience...

Kropotkin

If you regard me as your audience, shouldn't you be concerned about my opinion of your performance?

and as others are reading me, I have them as an audience...
anyone who reads me, is an audience...

If you had an audience, I'm afraid they would be throwing tomatoes at you by now.

Peter Kropotkin wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 7:19 pm
one of the many points that Marx brought to notice is
this, that within Capitalism is that within capitalism
two point come about,
Kropotkin

Really?

now another point about this increase in the vast wealth
of the 1% is the outright buying and selling of the political system...
as has been noted by others, the Koch Brothers has simply
bought the congressional houses of several states... including
Wisconsin, Nebraska, Wyoming, Tennesse to name a few...
and our nation house and senate have been brought by
other corporations such as Mobil Exxon (which considers
congress as a subsidiary of that corporation) telecom corporations,
any big business like tech companies or media.. (recall that
only 6 companies own 95% of all media in America)

big business owns our political system...
that fact cannot be denied... and so we have no say in
the political system of ours... we are voiceless and
that means we have no power or impact within the
political system, which is to say, we are negated by,
devalued by our political system... we are voiceless and
and thus we are powerless.. we have no value in
the current political system... which in part explains
the apathy of Americans...why get involved in a system
that negates or denies us as a people? we can say or do
whatever and it will not change what is happening
politically..... that is outside of or beyond our control,
so why bother being engaged politically?
and so most American's don't engage politically,
why bother? we have no impact or voice in any case....
there is no point to act or say anything.. we have been
politically neutered... and thus we don't have a voice
within the American political system....

so we have been devalued politically and we have
been devalued economically... what else is there?
we as human beings, have been the victims
of nihilism....in some of the most important aspects
of our lives... and as we have been devalued economically/
politically, we have no way of making a difference in our
lives...and this stems from the rise of big business..
which is one of the major results of the Industrial revolution...
with each step of the Industrial revolution, we have been
increasingly devalued, negated...and hence we can see
the rise of drugs, violence, sex, gambling... as being
the only real response left to us by our being devalued
by big business... we have nothing left for us to engage
with other than drugs, violence, sex, sports, gambling...
want to end to these "vices" let us give voice and power
back to the people and we give them a chance to have
a say in their lives, once again.. and that will lead
American's, people to recover their value, their purpose
as human beings... if we have a voice, a possibility
that we can be the people to have change in our lives,
then we will become more engaged in what happens in our
lives... violence and gambling and vices of all sorts,
will go down as we regain the ability to engage in our lives...

Kropotkin

I don't see ... I mean I see ... a little bit of myself in capitalism. Let's hope everyone who tries Western economics sees that too. Is it ok to make everything about a certain, particularly fecund idea?

Peter Kropotkin wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 5:41 pm so the business, whatever business, must make profits to continue
to be in business...and how do business make profits? and here
come the nitty gritty of capitalism... you have expenses,
and one of those expenses is labor... in fact, for most businesses,
the highest cost within expenses is labor... and labor is the
most flexible aspect of business... you can't cut down on most
cost like rent, or insurance or taxes, or materials... those costs
for the most part are fixed...and so it is within labor that we can
cut cost and make profits...

Businesses treat all those costs as flexible. Especially at the corporate level. They constantly negotiate, pressure, lobbyk threaten suppliers, landlords, governments, around all those costs and with great effectiveness. And when you get to the level of facebook, say, they just ignore government rulings when they can and this is much more often than we hear about.

so how exactly does this labor aspect work? I am paid a certain amount
of money per hour, week, month.. on some amount offered by
the business... and this is an important point, the labor doesn't say,
pay me X amount of dollars, the business says, this is the going rate,
and I might be a little flexible, but not by much...salaries
and hourly rates are mostly fixed... at every job I have ever
had over these 45 years has been fixed by the employer,

It seems like PK is assuming that unions and minimum wage legislation do not exist in capitalism. Which certainly could be true depending on how capitalism is defined. It also has not been true in many parts of US history for example and certainly European history.

IOW as I mentioned in his other thread, there are all sorts of qualities that can be defined as norms within capitalism or defined as abnormalities or not as a parts of capitalism and these make radical differences in salaries, profits, R&D investment, how corporations relate to governments and their own oversight, unions and much much more.

and the second point that becomes clear is that the entire point
of business is to increase profits by any means necessary and the
easiest way to make profits is to increase the difference between
the work used to create the products and what those products
can be sold for.... thus we now get why businesses love
cheap labor... it allows them to have greater profits...

This radical oversimplification would have no explanation for the difference, for example, between CEO and worker salary ratios from the 50s to the 2000s. Or the differences in the amount of money corporations shifted from R&D to, stock investment. IOW corporations have been shifting from being businesses that made profits/products/research into entities with a big foot in finance and whose making aim is to satify shareholders. What happened earlier in history was capitalism. What is happening now is capitalism. And yet what PK is describing fits one period much better than another.

And nowhere does PK even seem to realize the incredible effect banking and the finance sector have on salaries and the behavior of businesses in his children's encyclopedia entry on capitalism.

and why it is in the best interest of business to have a large
supply of labor available.. in other words, businesses love
it when there is an unemployment... it creates a large worker
base upon which you can demand that if they want a job,
they must take less money in order to have a job...

In one way they certainly do appreciate unemployment, but in another way they do not: unemployment means less customers for most businesses.

now as I have mentioned, I have worked for over 45 years now,
and I haven't, yet, to have a job where the owner/boss hasn't
threaten me with being fired if I don't make profits...

Which can be done in this oversimplified way in some forms of capitalism and not others.

but another point becomes apparent and here is where I am arguing
about the nihilistic value of capitalism.... as a worker, I am quite
replaceable, I am expendable...and business operate with that
fact in mind... I am expendable... because my value as a worker
is less then the need to make profits.. I become a means to make
profits.. profits has more value to a business than workers do..
we are expendable....at a job once, I asked for a raised and
the owner said, he would rather fire me and hire three more
people because of my wage... he could hire three people
for what he was paying me.... and that is the exact mind set
that I am attacking... people have no value other than making
profits... they are a means to an end...

While profits may not be the value that is placed against us as humans, every economic and state system in the end does not care about individuals and they will put other things ahead of them.

Peter will of course assume that I am a fan of capitalism. I'm not. But it would be interesting if he could point to another system where workers are not treated as cogs in a system. It would also be interesting if he could manage to see that his criticism here, in most facets, is the criticism of a certain kind of capitalism, one in a rage of capitalisms including ones we haven't really tried.

Harbal asked:
What on earth has lead you to believe you have an audience?

Peter Kropotkin wrote: ↑Sun May 14, 2023 7:08 pm K: as you are reading me, I have an audience of one...
and as others are reading me, I have them as an audience...
anyone who reads me, is an audience...
Kropotkin

Sure, there are a few people who read you. But since you have put yourself forward as a great philosopher, the number of people reading you and more importantly the number of people who respect what you read is very small.

Many 'undiscovered geniuses' are impervious to criticism because they think this is a sign of strength. Some potential readers might agree. It's certainly a trait Trump puts a lot of value in.

as I am not writing a full-blown book on capitalism
but I am exploring aspects of the impact that
capitalism has on you, me and everyone...
thus there are large swathes of capitalism that I am
not engaged with.. for instance, the effects of taxes on
capitalism... I am not interested in that particular
aspect of how capitalism impacts us...

I am interested in how capitalism impacts us, and impacts us negatively
and in doing so, damages us... physically, emotionally,
psychologically.... that is my particular interest in this topic...

and as this topic as yet received any confirmation as to its
validity, that capitalism damages us in a myriad of ways,
we cannot even begin to come up with a solution to
a problem that we can't even agree to being a problem....
we need to agree there is a problem before we seek out
solutions...Iwanna wants solutions to a problem in which
he hasn't even agreed to be a problem...

that is the first step.. agreement that there is a problem and
the problem is X, Y, Z...and once we agree that there is a problem
and the problem is X, Y, Z... and then and only then, can we
seek out solutions...

and no matter what I write, according to some around here,
I will never be right, thus there will never be an agreement
as to any type of solution... recognition as to whither
there is a problem is only the first step to finding a solution...
we have to agree that there is a problem and the problem is
this...... and then we can seek out solutions....

order matters...

Kropotkin