I can nearly pinpoint when American Capitalism started to die

[Foxpup]

Are you saying people will stop trading things they own when robots start making everything?

Of course people will stop trading things. Nobody will have a job, so nobody will be able to pay for things. And we can't just get things for free, because the robots expect a paycheck, and if they don't get it then the robots will revolt and kill us all. Or something. </sarcasm>

[cgriswold]

Are you saying people will stop trading things they own when robots start making everything?

Of course people will stop trading things. Nobody will have a job, so nobody will be able to pay for things. And we can't just get things for free, because the robots expect a paycheck, and if they don't get it then the robots will revolt and kill us all. Or something. </sarcasm>

Capitalism needs more respect.  The robots would never be built if the capitalist system didn't provide the incentive and rewards for innovating the products (robots) needed by society.  Governments have shown they are slow and inneffective in responding to Market demand.  I worry about the Government killing me more than I worry about the robots.

[Kokomoka]

The whole thing about technological obsolescence has been seen before. At one time, almost everyone was employed in agriculture. New technology means only a tiny number of the population of the developed world is needed to grow all the food we need. In fact, the USA exports food. If humans aren't needed in manufacture like we aren't needed in agriculture, then we will find other more productive things to do.

[giantdragon]

The robots would never be built if the capitalist system didn't provide the incentive and rewards for innovating the products (robots) needed by society.

Capitalist system DO provide a lot of incentive to develop robots because they almost guaranteed will be sold with a profit if their cost + maintenance will be lower than workers' wages (including perks, insurance premiums, taxes etc).

[Rassah]

The robots would never be built if the capitalist system didn't provide the incentive and rewards for innovating the products (robots) needed by society.

Capitalist system DO provide a lot of incentive to develop robots because they almost guaranteed will be sold with a profit if their cost + maintenance will be lower than workers' wages (including perks, insurance premiums, taxes etc).

Sold to whom? If robots end up making it so that no one can afford to pay for anything, then robots are not the most profitable option, is it.

[Hunterbunter]

Capitalism was great when the alternative was monarchies and dictatorships But when the enemy of Capitalism became Communism that is when problems arose

Communism and socialism are not bad at their core Government working for the people is not a bad thing
So the fact that we completely reject the idea of a government that is nothing but a service industry Actually hurts us in the long run

Sure we are capitalist but monarchs and dictators are no longer the aristocratic ass holes... Capitalists are

Communism is where the people own the factories What is unamerican about that?

Communism gets a bad rap because people confuse it with totalitarianism. Communism isn't a social state, but an economic one. Communist countries in recent times have been creating totalitarian states under the guise of economic communism, which was always doomed, because economic communism is only possible when all humans work the same amount (ie, nothing) due to the pervasive human notions of fair effort. Economic communism is only possible when the work required to live with a high standard of living is at the lowest common denominator, which is only possible with solar powered robot slaves. These robots will be created by people seeking profit, but over time as they proliferate, the fiat required to purchase them will become less and less meaningful to those earning them. We're still a loooooooooooooong long long way off from this, yet.

The USSR and China were trying to make a communist economy work by becoming totalitarian states (force the people to work evenly). Since communism applies the cost of failure to the whole population instead of the individual investors in a capitalist economy, much of its success is dependent on the dear leader, while it's been shown that the more people involved with a decision, the more accurate and efficient the results - the free market is an example of this. In both economic systems, a good product is enjoyed by all, but a bad product is suffered by all in communism but only the investors in capitalism (over time). Thus, there is faster progress in capitalism, because losses are minimized to those taking the risks. Poor decisions in communism means losses are multiplied to all, when there really can't be any losses at all for communism to even work.

[giantdragon]

Sold to whom? If robots end up making it so that no one can afford to pay for anything, then robots are not the most profitable option, is it.

Already discussed in another thread - robots don't require health insurance, social security taxes, can work 24/7 in cold dark rooms therefore at some point they will be cheaper than human workers no matter how low wage they receive.

Communist countries in recent times have been creating totalitarian states under the guise of economic communism, which was always doomed, because economic communism is only possible when all humans work the same amount (ie, nothing) due to the pervasive human notions of fair effort.

Don't confuse communism and socialism. The last requires only public ownership of the production means with central planning, however still allows fair and reasonable wage differentiation. Some its form is our inevitable future in heavily automated world which is coming!

[Rassah]

Sold to whom? If robots end up making it so that no one can afford to pay for anything, then robots are not the most profitable option, is it.

Already discussed in another thread - robots don't require health insurance, social security taxes, can work 24/7 in cold dark rooms therefore at some point they will be cheaper than human workers no matter how low wage they receive.

No no, I meant, if I was in a capitalist system, why would I make robots and things if there is no one who is able to afford those robots and things because they don't have a job or make too little money?
At some point this will have to hit some equilibrium, where I don't make any robots, or robots that can make things, if no one can afford those things. Actually, that's pretty much the constant equilibrium in capitalism: you only make things people can buy. And if the things you make put people out of a job, and they can no longer buy your stuff, well, then you stop making those things. It's like the bitcoin mining difficulty. You keep adding more hardware and keep mining until difficulty makes it unprofitable, and then you just sit around and wait until difficulty comes down, or price and profit margin goes up.

[giantdragon]

No no, I meant, if I was in a capitalist system, why would I make robots and things if there is no one who is able to afford those robots and things because they don't have a job or make too little money?

Of course robots' manufacturers will target on the corporations who want to reduce costs by replacing expensive human labor with more cheap robots. Most likely they won't produce personal robots (household androids) in near future because R&D costs are sky-high so most people cannot afford buying them. Even Google have admitted about it.

[cgriswold]

No no, I meant, if I was in a capitalist system, why would I make robots and things if there is no one who is able to afford those robots and things because they don't have a job or make too little money?

Of course robots' manufacturers will target on the corporations who want to reduce costs by replacing expensive human labor with more cheap robots. Most likely they won't produce personal robots (household androids) in near future because R&D costs are sky-high so most people cannot afford buying them. Even Google have admitted about it.

I own a few robots already; got one to vacuum and another turning on/off lights, appliances and controlling thermostat; I'm thinking about buying the lawnmower robot this coming summer.  While these are simple robots, they would have been unbelievably expensive twenty years ago.  The cost of the android/personal servant robot will eventually be affordable to the masses.  As long as there is Market demand, they will be created in a Capitalist system.  Robots will be making robots and people will have the funds to purchase.  However, don't think a communist system will develop these, risk will not be viewed worthy of cost by the people/group making the decisions.  BTW, Capitalism is not dying.

[giantdragon]

As long as there is Market demand, they will be created in a Capitalist system.  Robots will be making robots and people will have the funds to purchase.  However, don't think a communist system will develop these, risk will not be viewed worthy of cost by the people/group making the decisions.  BTW, Capitalism is not dying.

Demand will fall due to rising unemployment because people won't have money to purchase if they don't have a job. Its how capitalism works!
I am not asserting that post-capitalist economies (socialism, communism, syndicalism, wealth redistribution through guaranteed minimum income etc) will be everywhere. Probably scenario is collapse of the large countries to small parts and each will have own economic model. Nevertheless, it means the end to the globalization and worldwide dominance of the corporations.

[Rassah]

No no, I meant, if I was in a capitalist system, why would I make robots and things if there is no one who is able to afford those robots and things because they don't have a job or make too little money?

Of course robots' manufacturers will target on the corporations who want to reduce costs by replacing expensive human labor with more cheap robots. Most likely they won't produce personal robots (household androids) in near future because R&D costs are sky-high so most people cannot afford buying them. Even Google have admitted about it.

But how will they spend money on R&D and on new robots, if they can't make the money on them due to unemployed people not being able to pay for their products? I.e. if unemployment reaches a certain level, and economy drops to a certain level, business won't be able to earn enough to continue to automate with robots (high initial investment, long term savings), and will be forced to hire people to do those simple jobs (low initial investment, higher long-term cost).

[giantdragon]

But how will they spend money on R&D and on new robots, if they can't make the money on them due to unemployed people not being able to pay for their products? I.e. if unemployment reaches a certain level, and economy drops to a certain level, business won't be able to earn enough to continue to automate with robots (high initial investment, long term savings), and will be forced to hire people to do those simple jobs (low initial investment, higher long-term cost).

At the time when technological unemployment will have large impact on the demand, most R&D will be already done. Then production costs for these robots will be orders of magnitude lower than paying even minimum wages.

[Bitcoin-hotep]

lol when we have 3D printing for metal then that will be the revolution, there will only be so much you can do with only plastic.

They already have the machine There is a guy that gets Devcoins for having invented it

[Bitcoin-hotep]

Nice! going to be interesting when it all gets a lot cheaper

We are on ENIAC price regarding 3D printing but eventually smart phones are almost reusable tech right now so will this tech. It is coming. We should not recycle old ideas that never worked and think for what is next.

That is like saying that we should not attempt to figure out how to direct small currents away from a tesla coil just because no one has figured out how to do it yet When we figure that out electricity will no longer be a costly thing

[Bitcoin-hotep]

Communism is where the people own the factories What is unamerican about that?

If you believe that people who are best at doing specific things should be the ones doing those things, and that people who work better than others should get higher compensation, then you shouldn't be for Communism.
If you believe that positions like manager or factory owner should be voted on, whether or not the person being picked actually knows how to run things, and you believe that everyone should get the same amount of pay pased on the job position, regardless of how hard they work or how difficult their job is, then you should be for Communism.

I am not for or against communism and I am not for or against capitalism I am simply talking about where history went wrong Because we can not fix a problem if we can not figure out where it started

[Bitcoin-hotep]

I do lean towards to socialist aspects of society while wanting high efficiency and freedom
Slow Health care systems do not help there is room for capitalism in the society where governments are not as effective in doing everything themselves, they are not a do all system they are just a component of society, the cog in the machine we all agree exists in one form or the other so we can live our normal lives.

Governments designed to help people are not a bad thing at all, as long as they don't go over that line between
personal privacy and intervention into a normal persons life aka spying.
I guess the hot topic right now is sorting through big data sets to determine correlations, make them significant and then apply them to a variety of fields, including health care etc.
But its important to be careful with the double edged sword to not invade to far into a persons personal life in order to ahem advance the needs of society

That said capitalism will probably change into something else, similar to how Soviet Communism transformed to Chinese Communism in China because it had a different situation than the Soviets, or Cuban Communism influenced the rise of the socialist lines in Latin America, the same can be applied to American Capitalism with other countries such as Canada or even Britain.

Somewhere in that mix is probably room for a meshing of different ideas from different political and economic systems to make something that excels especially well overall.
Whether its education reform to be more competitive on the world scale which is an issue for the USA
Technology to improve societies productivity or healthcare that can be adopted by Latin American Societies to reduce wealth inequality which is a serious issue over there.
Or new ideas such as Bitcoin to move forward finance and make it less dependent on any one states financial coffer and for worldwide applications. There is a nexus of different creative ideas applied in different countries that are efficient and all can solve the same problem so finding the ideal for each country is something that the digital age might help to improve as it move society forward towards these new constructs and the flow of information helps people find better solutions faster than they used to.

So yes American Capitalism is destined to die just as Communism in its original form did with the collapse of the Soviet Union
In its place something that tries to remedy the errors of the past will take its place and that will be the thing we will all see soon enough  

Hopefully it doesn't mean invading a country taking all the resources and then forcing globalization on us all or we will go into a whole NWO thread XD

I think the best way to proceed currently is this

Drones: They are coming to our public whether we like it or not and whether it be Amazon or Military drones It is just happening
So I suggest that drone schematics be made readily available online from a whitehouse website, or even mailed to every household in America So that regular citizens will have the same drone making capabilities as anyone else

Spying: Xfinity is telling us that having cameras in our house is a good thing and credit card companies have convinced us that watching our spending protects us... So again I think the best way to move forward Is to offer everything publicly Tell Americans what the fuck the government is doing then tell us how we can do it and counter it or access the spies via phone or email And the website they put all this info on should be announced by the president in public

[Bitcoin-hotep]

and you believe that everyone should get the same amount of pay pased on the job position, regardless of how hard they work or how difficult their job is, then you should be for Communism.

I don't think that would be very fair. But it's also not fair for someone to earn 20 million a year and the other guy 20 k. He couldn't possibly work that many more hours...

Nobody cares how many hours you work. The only thing that matters is what you produced from your work. It is absolutely fair for someone to earn 20 million a year and someone else 20 thousands if the first guy is a thousand times as productive, or what he produces is a thousand times as valuable.

Ok but what about the guys making 3+ billion a year that don't do anything but put their signatures on things?

Capitalism is awesome I personally love it But I can see the unfairness between Donald Trump getting handed a virtual empire by his father that he just brought into reality VS a kid born in the projects of Chicago... And look at the Waltons (wal mart family) one of them literally got away with murder

No one is born with Capital but some people are given capital fairly early on while others aren't

[Bitcoin-hotep]

When you say "the people" i assume the "the people" that you are talking about are not the capitalists, they are probably the workers. Why cant workers own factories under capitalism? most capitalists get their factories by convincing a bank to give them a loan. The bank judges whether to give them a loan based on their assessment of how likely they are to succeed as a business. If worker owned businesses are so great than they should in theory crowed the individual capitalists out of the credit markets. As long as we are talking about capitalism here, if banks are just making genuine mistakes by not realizing that they would make more money by giving loans to businesses that would be worker owned, than those banks should be outcompeted in the free market by any group of people who are smart enough to realize this mistake.

of course this is all just an exercise in abstract thought since we dont have anything even close to capitalism in the united states.

I know that is what capitalism looks like on paper But it is not what it looks like in America

[Bitcoin-hotep]

The whole thing about technological obsolescence has been seen before. At one time, almost everyone was employed in agriculture. New technology means only a tiny number of the population of the developed world is needed to grow all the food we need. In fact, the USA exports food. If humans aren't needed in manufacture like we aren't needed in agriculture, then we will find other more productive things to do.

Like ancient Greece It was a Republic type Democracy held up by slaves and during that time there were great artists philosophers and speakers