[jeffkrol]

The tighter the control gets the less freedoms people have, and the closer you get to fascism.



What makes free market capitalism "amoral"? Crony-capitalism is amoral, but crony-capitalism is fascism or Neo-Corporatism as it is currently called since fascism is such a dirty word. It is the same thing. There is nothing amoral about freedom.


So when GM does it you call it "shenanigans", but when mortgage companies do it you call it fraud? Why the double standard?

no, nothing you said makes sense... what morals are there to making a profit???
and I see little difference in beholding to the "company store" or to a gov.............. both can be bad..

[jtkratzer]

no, nothing you said makes sense... what morals are there to making a profit???
and I see little difference in beholding to the "company store" or to a gov.............. both can be bad..

How can you question the morality of being profitable? It's not a moral issue. The way you become profitable is where one can question your integrity. Making a profit and being successful is not a bad or evil thing - it's called taking care of your business (which keeps your employees employed) and allowing you to support your family and the families of your employees by providing them a paycheck.

GM is not doing that. Global marketing guy - fired. Global manufacturing guy and some other high-level executive - demoted.

GM's stock is below $20/share and needs to be way over the $50 mark to repay the bailout loans. Something like 93% of their loans are going to subprime buyers. The number of loans going to buyers with credit scores below 540 is on the rise. The company is a mess and going down the tubes after a $49.5 billion dollar gift of taxpayer dollars.

The fact the President will not acknowledge a mistake and let this thing die is asinine. It's one more example (just like the White House intel leaks), where political gain is more important than budgets, wasting taxpayer dollars, political honesty, etc. It's one more example of how Obama is absolutely not the guy he campaigned as saying he was going to change Washington and end the partisan wars. He's just another political scum bag that will say and do anything to keep his office.

[jeffkrol]

How can you question the morality of being profitable? It's not a moral issue.

Correct, by definition Capitalism is AMORAL... what don't you understand??

it's called taking care of your business (which keeps your employees employed) and allowing you to support your family and the families of your employees by providing them a paycheck.

first, if the biz didn't NEED employees it would care not one bit whether they ate or not, as long as the owner was comfortable.
second certainly few businesses would pick the collective welfare of it's employes over the welfare of the owner (there are rarely a few) . And in this I'm just using a relative scale..i.e employees making more than an owner, who still could live "comfortably"...

that is your biggest mistake, confusing need for morality.........self interest for caring........

http://www.fff.org/freedom/0697c.asp

I suspect this is "your view"??

If conservatives wish to offer advice to willing listeners on how to live virtuously, let them do so. But when they condemn capitalism, they imply that they think the people have too much liberty. When they favor laws against drugs and pornography, they are saying that people should not be permitted to trade in certain kinds of property. Their devotion to property rights is, to put it mildly, less than complete. When they favor laws against prostitution, they demonstrate that their commitment to self-ownership is weak. They would not join in my paraphrase of Voltaire: I may dislike what you trade, but I will defend to the death your right to trade it.

I, for one, would like to object to the claim that capitalism is amoral. In the market, people may engage in any peaceful conduct, even if it is "immoral."

http://www.fff.org/freedom/0697c.asp

sounds more "self serving" which is the antithesis of a "society"...........

[Winder]

no, nothing you said makes sense... what morals are there to making a profit???
and I see little difference in beholding to the "company store" or to a gov.............. both can be bad..

I am self-employed. I am "beholding" to nobody. I don't spend my time hoping someone gives me a job, pays my healthcare, or handles my retirement. I am less of a slave than any employee. The reason I am less of a slave is that I know how to make a profit. If you don't know how to make a profit then you will be a slave all your life.

If you can not grasp the idea of profit then where do we start. Profit only comes from meeting the wants and needs of consumers. Companies that can meet these needs and serve the consumer will make profits. Companies that fail to do so will not make a profit and fail.

A factory worker's wages are his profits. Should factory workers work for free? People seeking profits are who support you and provide you with everything you see around you. The computer you use, the camera you own, the car you drive, and the fuel you burn. Every person involved in the process is seeking an individual profit.

There is a world of morality is the act of making an honest wage/profit and being able to support your family and even to help others. It does not matter if it is the guy who cuts your grass for a profit or the thousands of people who work to provide you with energy to heat and cool your home. You should be thankful that there are so many people actually willing to work for a profit. I don't know many people who would show up for work if they were not going to make money.

[jeffkrol]

I am self-employed. I am "beholding" to nobody. I don't spend my time hoping someone gives me a job, pays my healthcare, or handles my retirement. I am less of a slave than any employee. The reason I am less of a slave is that I know how to make a profit. If you don't know how to make a profit then you will be a slave all your life.

If you can not grasp the idea of profit then where do we start. Profit only comes from meeting the wants and needs of consumers. Companies that can meet these needs and serve the consumer will make profits. Companies that fail to do so will not make a profit and fail.

A factory worker's wages are his profits. Should factory workers work for free? People seeking profits are who support you and provide you with everything you see around you. The computer you use, the camera you own, the car you drive, and the fuel you burn. Every person involved in the process is seeking an individual profit.

There is a world of morality is the act of making an honest wage/profit and being able to support your family and even to help others. It does not matter if it is the guy who cuts your grass for a profit or the thousands of people who work to provide you with energy to heat and cool your home. You should be thankful that there are so many people actually willing to work for a profit. I don't know many people who would show up for work if they were not going to make money.

I didn't realize you live in a vacuum..........you are "beholden" to the part of society that buys your junk.........As usual your sides MAJOR ignoring of reality is pitifully obvious............

[Winder]

Correct, by definition Capitalism is AMORAL... what don't you understand??

You want to show me a definition from a credible source that describes it in this way. I have accused you of living in Wonder Land a few times, but you are really going off the deep end now.

[jeffkrol]

You want to show me a definition from a credible source that describes it in this way. I have accused you of living in Wonder Land a few times, but you are really going off the deep end now.

google it yourself.. here use capitalism amoral.. give it a try.

http://www.amazon.com/Capitalism-As-Moral-System-Critique/dp/1849801290

http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online

http://mises.org/page/1430

from a credible source

now there is the problem.. defining credible source by your own terms biases reality........... and ends any real discussion......

just for fun:

Smith was even less kindly to the role of landlords, where he recognized no economic function whatever that they might perform. In pungent passages, he writes that 'As soon as the land of any country has all become private property, the landlords like to reap where they never sowed and demand a rent even for its natural produce'. And again: 'as soon as the land becomes private property, the landlord demands a share of almost all the produce which the labourer can either raise or collect from it'. There is no hint of recognition here that the landlord performs the vital function of allocating the land to its most productive use. Instead, these passages were to become understandable red meat for socialists and for Henry Georgists in calls for the nationalizing of land.

As we shall see further below, Smith's labour theory of value did inspire a number of English socialists before Marx, generally named 'Ricardian' but actually 'Smithian' socialists, who decided that if labour produced the whole product, and rent and profit are deductions from labour's produce, then the entire value of the product should rightfully go to its creators, the labourers.

---

Last edited by jeffkrol; 07-30-2012 at 08:24 AM.

[Winder]

google it yourself.. here use capitalism amoral.. give it a try.

Amazon.com: Capitalism As a Moral System: Adam Smith's Critique of the Free Market Economy (9781849801294): Spencer J. Pack: Books

Cambridge Journals Online - Abstract

Amazon.com: How to Make ESP Work for You (9780449212028): Harold Sherman: Books

Here is a book on Amazon title "How to Make ESP Work For You". Since there is a book on Amazon it must be true........

If you really believe capitalism is amoral, then stop participating in the amoral act. Capitalism is not perfect, but no other system has done more to reduce poverty and improve the lives of people in the world than capitalism.

The reason people pay me to do what I do is because it is a mutually beneficial exchange. There is nothing amoral about an exchange where two people improve their lives. You need to stop eating the mushrooms in you profile picture.

[jeffkrol]

Amazon.com: How to Make ESP Work for You (9780449212028): Harold Sherman: Books

Here is a book on Amazon title "How to Make ESP Work For You". Since there is a book on Amazon it must be true........

If you really believe capitalism is amoral, then stop participating in the amoral act. Capitalism is not perfect, but no other system has done more to reduce poverty and improve the lives of people in the world than capitalism.

The reason people pay me to do what I do is because it is a mutually beneficial exchange. There is nothing amoral about an exchange where two people improve their lives. You need to stop eating the mushrooms in you profile picture.

there is nothing wrong w/ being amoral.. as long as you recognize it (and control it, just like an animal ).. You should be happy I didn't say it was "immoral".. though the argument CAN be made.......

Capitalism is not perfect, but no other system has done more to reduce poverty and improve the lives of people in the world

what capitalism giveth, capitalism taketh away.. For every "winner" there must be a "loser"........ in capitalism.
to borrow someone elses words:

The tenets of capitalism are amoral. They do not imply doing a thing either ethically or unethically, they simply prescribe a goal and a method. The way people apply that method or pursue that goal can be done more or less ethically. There are some schools of thought that say capitalism must be inherently exploitative, but I remain unsure on that point. It may simply be true that capitalism is just applied easier/remains more competitive when it is exploitative. In practice it's the same thing, but there is a theoretical difference.

Capitalism is not immoral but amoral. It does what its users demand of it. It has given us a choice of food, travel and technology that kings could only dream of. It will invent whatever instruments governments and consumers want, and if not given limits, its inventiveness knows few bounds.

These limits come from two sources: politicians and culture. And ultimately, it's the culture that counts. The Catholic theologian Michael Novak said every nation has an economy, a democratic government and a moral culture sphere – what David Cameron calls the "big society". It's the family, the church, the charity, the local school, the trade union – the parts of life not controlled by commerce or government – and it has shrivelled in the west. We have entered a vicious cycle where both government and capitalism have eaten into the culture's ability to be a countervailing and moderating force.

The big mistake made by libertarians is to assume that economic and social liberalism go together. Liberal capitalism requires social conservatism. It needs the virtue-generating institutions or there'll be no thrift, no duty, no honesty, no Protestant work ethic.

Civilisation is a project that starts anew with every generation, else we're all on the road to the Lord of the Flies.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/nov/11/capitalism-amoral-worst-enemy-people

Adam Smith’s famous statement about self-interest from The Wealth of Nations is directly relevant to our contemporary debates about the morality of capitalism:

It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages.

Smith’s economic insight is to see that self-interest and capitalism do not generate social conflict. His analysis led him to see that self-interested individuals would mostly engage in win-win transactions—that the profit motive, property rights, divisions of labor, competition, and other features of capitalism would lead to individual prosperity and social harmony. But Smith retained the traditional ethical belief that the good of society as a whole is the moral standard of value.

http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/EthicsandEconomics.html

[normhead]

Can you imagine how wound up Jack will be? On the one hand, anything Obama does is pure evil, but on the other hand, imagine what kind of shape Detroit would be in if Obama just let's GM sink into the economic cesspool.

You mean like Mitt Ronmey's family did?

Hey WInder, any con man can say what you said about supporting yourself. That doesn't make them moral? A bit of perspective.

[Winder]

For every "winner" there must be a "loser"

So if you buy a new Pentax camera, who is the winner and who is the loser?

[Winder]

there is nothing wrong w/ being amoral.. as long as you recognize it (and control it, just like an animal ).. You should be happy I didn't say it was "immoral".. though the argument CAN be made.......

You are correct. You said amoral and I read immoral. My fault.

[jeffkrol]

So if you buy a new Pentax camera, who is the winner and who is the loser?

well lets see.. sweat shops in the Philippians, Vietnam and China... Workers in Japan...........................who lost their jobs..........
and every worker who now needs a salary cut to continue...

You win.. you get a shiny camera.. Pentax JP wins because they get your monopoly money to play with.........

[jeffkrol]

You are correct. You said amoral and I read immoral. My fault.

no problem

[Winder]

well lets see.. sweat shops in the Philippians, Vietnam and China... Workers in Japan...........................who lost their jobs..........
and every worker who now needs a salary cut to continue...

You win.. you get a shiny camera.. Pentax JP wins because they get your monopoly money to play with.........

So what is your answer? People stop working? Is work the problem? Should people in the Vietnam stop working?