chomsky on free market myths

[marvenger]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgFlJ...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au2Ai...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SWT4...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAEAH...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=em1bw...eature=related

"Democracy is those who work in the mills own the mills'

I think that's the centre of it, if you believe in democracy then the above has to be how the system is based. corporatism is no different to other totalitarianisms.

If you don't think that an economy can work based on the above quote then you can't believe in democracy.

That's how i'm currently seeing it anyway.

[*T*]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

Democracy is those who work in the mills own the mills

I would call that Co-operatism / Socialism / Communism.
In the sense I am not averse to.

[marvenger]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

yeah I think it would have to be a planned egalitarian economy, which raises a lot of hairy questions. But now we've got a poorly planned oligarchical kleptocracy economy. I'd like to give the hairy problems a go.

[Sharky]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

"Democracy is those who work in the mills own the mills'

The problem is that the "mills" weren't originally created by those who work in them. What happens to the people who risked their time and capital to start the companies in the first place? Are they just supposed to step aside and let the "workers" take over? Or are workers supposed to "rise up" and take ownership by force?

What happens in the event that the company experiences an economic downturn? If everyone is an equal owner, who decides who gets laid-off? Are some people more equal than others? Or does everyone voluntarily take a pay cut so no one has to leave?

The bottom line is that companies are not democracies, and any company that tries to exist as such is doomed to failure.

[medved]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgFlJ...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au2Ai...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SWT4...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAEAH...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=em1bw...eature=related

"Democracy is those who work in the mills own the mills'

I think that's the centre of it, if you believe in democracy then the above has to be how the system is based. corporatism is no different to other totalitarianisms.

If you don't think that an economy can work based on the above quote then you can't believe in democracy.

That's how i'm currently seeing it anyway.

Another fine example of Mr. Хомский trying to prove that freedom is slavery. Looks very familiar. Same garbage they were teaching me for 20 years back in Russia.

[Supercilious]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

Another fine example of Mr. Хомский trying to prove that freedom is slavery. Looks very familiar. Same garbage they were teaching me for 20 years back in Russia.

Crony capitalism is terrible and an oppressive disgrace. The problem is a lot of garbage sellers are fooling those not so bright with the lie that communism (which is worse) is the right answer.

[metalman]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

Crony capitalism is terrible and an oppressive disgrace. The problem is a lot of garbage sellers are fooling those not so bright with the lie that communism (which is worse) is the right answer.

noticed that itulip for 10 years preached 1. it's crony capitalism and 2. it's bad because it leads to a crash and communism?

that's the whole friggin point of the site. get it???

[marvenger]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

capitalism doesn't always lead to crony capitalism? Sorry for not believing everything iTulip tells me. I'm pointing out that I see what chomsky means when he says that 'democracy is those who work in the mills own mills' Freedom under capitalism is the freedom for anyone to rise to status of slave owner and this is inherently unstable. If you think this is the best situation then I guess there is a lot of evidence provided by capitalists to back up the arguement, but call a spade a spade, its not democracy.

[metalman]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

capitalism doesn't always lead to crony capitalism? Sorry for not believing everything iTulip tells me. I'm pointing out that I see what chomsky means when he says that 'democracy is those who work in the mills own mills' Freedom under capitalism is the freedom for anyone to rise to status of slave owner and this is inherently unstable. If you think this is the best situation then I guess there is a lot of evidence provided by capitalists to back up the arguement, but call a spade a spade, its not democracy.

speaking as a former mill worker who now runs his own modest biz... bullshit.

[marvenger]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

yeah and if you pursued your success, or if you didn't someone else did, grew massive and then has a shit load of power to really influence things in their benefit over labour and competitors. Through all the fragility of this its ordinary guy who suffers the most. Couldn't happen could it?

Don't think I'm saying that democracy is utopia, there are obvious freedoms that have to be given up but it seems like the adult way to do things to me.

And the egalitarianism being proposed is through equal power. I wouldn't take the owning of the mills things literally because if everyone owns equally then there's no point in owning, I just take the owning of the mills quote to mean equal power. Therefore this rules out stalinism.

I'm only just really looking into this in any depth but seeing as its pretty obvious that we've been fed a lot of crap about the virtues of the free market, and yes I understand the difference between FIRE and real economy and still believe real economy free market is prone to cronyism just not as bad as FIRE, I think its prudent to look at the arguments of people who aren't free market idealogues. There's some truth to their arguments and yes they're also pushing their own agenda.

I think Karl Polanyi also has some great ideas. His ideas of embeddedness where the economic system is embedded in society and the way free market fundamentalism is forcing more and more of society to be embedded in the artificial human construct of the market economy will cause society with its realtionship to the environment around it to fight back against the individualism and the artificiality of the free market. You see it all the time.

[Rajiv]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

Marvenger,

While I enjoy Chomsky, and am sympathetic in general to his ideas, he is not necessarily correct here.

There is a place for collectives and cooperatives as well as limited liability corporations in the democratic scheme of things -- a society can be democratic even without everybody having to own their own means of production. And there have been extremely successful cooperatives in the US and Western Europe

The problem with the current corporatist setup which has resulted in the FIRE economy likely comes from other sources,

One good source on the problems of corporatism is POCLAD and I have likely referrred to it in some of my other posts

[marvenger]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

Thanks rajiv. I greatly appreciate all your efforts and please keep it coming. But at the moment I just can't get away from the thought that the only way to end this endless cycle of corruption and cronyism is through the elimination of ownership. Very hard thing to do, granted, it has to be eliminated from the psyche somehow; though not impossible as the bushmen of southern africa have shown.

Don't get me wrong I love the bushmen, I'm from southern africa myself, and they're the most beautiful people ever....but I also like science and the progress of science which is why I like Jacque Fresco and his venus project. Venus project is using technology and automation to produce a comfortable standard of living with no money exchanged and then people can follow their own interests outside of this. as long as they're not restricting the lives of others or damaging the environment that others have to live in. Very good stuff indeed I think.

I also love jacque's argument that automation is proceeding anyway and destrying the purchasing power needed for production and capitalism to work anyway.

[metalman]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

Thanks rajiv. I greatly appreciate all your efforts and please keep it coming. But at the moment I just can't get away from the thought that the only way to end this endless cycle of corruption and cronyism is through the elimination of ownership.

you mean like eliminate property rights?

[marvenger]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

yep, what have you got to fear if no else owns any land either.

[cjppjc]

Re: chomsky on free market myths

yep, what have you got to fear if no else owns any land either.

Please. One of the great differences between nations that were poor 30 years ago and those that are still poor is private property rights. East Asis V Africa.