Businesses, under capitalism, have one objective that overrides everything else: to grow capital. That's the core of the definition of capitalism. If you override that essential of the system, it's no longer capitalism.
That is true. But "how much growth is desired" is different among businessmen. Also, having the goal of growing capital does not mean that they are willing to do anything to achieve that goal. Most businessmen I know wouldn't hurt children, even if that would somehow increase their wealth.
except it used to be that with a little land and almost no income you could make and provide for yourself and your family- food, meat timber, extra to sell or to barter... horses that grew on your place and eat grass.. that doesnt work any longer
Capitalism and Socialism are powerful tools that can be used by responsible people to do good things for a community, whether that community is local, national or world-wide. They can also be used by predators to do harmful things to a community for personal gain. Capitalism can be used to raise money to build an industry that will keep a community safely and sustainably employed for many generations. Or, it can be used by predators to buy up a community's resources so that those predators can harvest the community's resources as fast and cheap as possible, flip the leftovers to another predator, then disappear leaving the cleanup to a devastated community. Socialism is a tool that can be used to make sure all the members of a community are safely housed, fed, clothed and healthy in a nurturing society. Or, it can be used to take away all those things by powerful control-freak leaders.
@Cheri Merchant Capitalism is the free exchange between consenting parties under a universal rule of law. No system ever created has lifted more people out of poverty quicker than free market capitalism. Nobody it taking anything from anyone else without their consent so were do you get the impression that capitalism takes anything away from anyone to the point of homelessness??? You seem to be equating slavery for capitalism in your description.
"Who is your Edgar, and what can you do to make the world a better place?" Counter-question: Does it matter what I do when I don't have any capital to do anything about it? I feel like it's always the case, where people defend capitalism on the basis of some people doing good with it, when by its very nature the people with the most power in capitalism are the ones who do not have good intentions. I'm glad I watched, but before I agree with him I would like him to approach other economic systems and explain why they are not viable.
Capitalism IS the only socioeconomic model that has PROVEN to pull more people out of poverty than any other model. One can read many books written by educated people who favors Socialism or Communism, or attend a humanities or economics class in college taught by a Socialist or Communist professor, and become persuaded by their indoctrination. Their #1 excuse for the failure of Socialism or Communism in a country is that “the model was poorly or incorrectly implemented”. The same can be said of Free Market, Freedom of Commerce, or Free Trade (Capitalism is the derogatory title by Marx), yet, to this day and as I said, is the ONLY socioeconomic model that has removed the most people out of poverty. It is quite the opposite under Socialism and Communism: under both models, the leadership (usually a dictatorship, a military regime) is the only people who are raised out of poverty, for the collect the money from its people to keep it for themselves and live a life of opulence. And, while the leaders of those countries are wearing Golden Goose or Roger Vivier tennis shoes, and Armani suits, the people are living in EQUALITY… all equally poor and miserable. Check for yourself and tell me of any Socialist or Communist leader who lives within the means as the rest of the country. *Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez’s worth = $2 Billion. *Cuba’s Fidel Castro’s worth = $900 Million. *Soviet Union’s Joseph Stalin’s worth = counted in the Billions of Dollars. *Russia’s Vladimir Putin’s worth = so far, $200 Billion. *China’s Mao Zedong’s worth = $1 Billion. *China’s XI Jinping’s worth = $1.2 Billion. *North Korea’s Kim Jong Un’s net worth = $5 Billion. In our Republic of the United States, a Presidents’ salary = $400 Thousand/year. Many government officials (including the other branches of government) are worth millions because the own businesses or have heavily invested in commodities. Capitalism has never failed. That being said, some capitalists have abused the system, but that, in no ways means it is a failed model.
This guy does not convince me one bit, especially after he went back to Edgar's story. Isn't Edgar in his miserable situation die to capitalism. This guy is saying capitalism works with good people. Well that's a dilema, isn't it..
I wonder if he included infilation rates at the chart at 4:15. Because 60$ a month in 1913 equals 1459$ in 2016. So you can't say people earning like 1.90$ a day was living in poverty. Anyone dare to explain?
If you live somewhere that the cost of food is $2 a week, shelter, clothing and any other necessities an other $2 dollar a week. So earn $6 a week, spend $4, you are not in poverty. ( Utopia ). If where you live it costs $40 a week for food, $50 for shelter, clothes etc an extra $20 then $13 a day is below poverty. If the cost of living is higher than the rate of pay, that is poverty. A different direction:- In country A, the worker earns $10 a day, but living costs $5 a day. In country B the worker earns $20 a day but living costs $15 a day. Who is better off, they are saving the same amount each week but the cost of living in country B is 3 time more, it will take 3 times longer to save up for those new shoes as these ones have cardboard inside as the tread.
Thank you someone else with common sense. I've missed you how are you my fellow human being? Little dramatic but common sense is hard to find these days. But seriously thank you.
Yes, this is true from about 7 years ago. They have completely shifted their giving strategy years ago and that specific unintended consequence is no longer happening. It's certainly easy to criticize and cast stones, but I give TOMS props for taking risks, giving away profits to help others, and inspiring thousands of entrepreneurs to think beyond making profits and instead look for ways to make this world a little better.
@@ArthurWahoowa The profiteering model should be abandoned in favor of an economic system that servers the needs of the people rather than arbitrary stock exchanges. A good start would to replace CEOs with workers making direct decisions about how to operate within their industry.
@@ArthurWahoowa How do you know that the CEOs have the benevolence and altruism to work for the society effectively and prioritize social well being over personal gains ? And, is it ethical to keep workers working for you at fixed wages when production, distribution, stock price everything is variable. In other words, a labor market surely needs labor, but what we have to ask ourselves is, does it need wealthy labor, is the laborers becoming as rich as the owners, beneficial to the consumers of the market, the owners of the company ? The company runs on production and distribution of whatever product or service it offers, in which the workers play a major role and obviously the most important role. The decisions that are taken are important but if the information and expertise, modularized using the same principles are available to the workers there is no reason to believe that they will not able to take decisions collectively, obviously through discussions and debates, I mean democratically. Finally to respond to the last sentence, I would just ask a simple question. Is their labor their property ? If yes, then the produce of that labor and the profits are their property too. If no, they are slaves.
@@ArthurWahoowa As you have jumped directly to questions about implementation I would assume you agree with me about the conclusion that the current system is morally unviable for the reasons I mentioned. I think by democratic workplace you mean one that would exist with the rest of the economy being exactly the same. Though I don't have a problem with someone trying that out, I don't think such an experiment has any prospect of success. The ones that I am aware of are either too small or with increase in size and scale has become more hierarchical and less democratic, as a response to string market forces. While writing my first comment what I had in mind was a society more or less devoid of wage earners. One that consists of either private people (who are not willing to economically interact with the society for whatever reasons), or people who work in democratic workplaces. Now considering this, let me respond to your apprehensions. Problem 1: Entrepreneurship cease to happen Lets see why entrepreneurship is so important to capitalism. It is important, as it brings to the fore new solutions to problems existing with current system or solutions to new problems, satisfying a new need which nobody might have ever thought of before. Firstly, if somebody can spot an inefficiency with the existing system in a democratic framework it can come to the fore much more easily, because the whole process of taking risk in a market place, which requires with idea, capital as well won't be required in this framework. Whoever has a better idea or a concern can just be raised in a council meeting and then it can be discussed, debated and finally evaluated though a referendum. Obviously in real world the process will be a bit more complicated, we can discuss much more of the details if you are interested. Secondly, solving new problem is precisely based on scientific advancement which requires huge amount of funding for research, hoping something comes out of that which can have real world applications. Now contrary to popular belief a major portion of the modern dynamic economy is based on research funded by our previous generations, not entrepreneurship. And given the funding and good quality education this won't be a problem. Additionally I think one thing a system like this will be particularly good at is responding to real human demands as they won't be manufactured and distorted through advertisements. Problem 2: Investment will cease The whole thing about investment has to do will surplus. As in an economy like this research and precautionary safety measures are the two things that require investment on, surplus can be generated through production to meet these demands. Now two things I think are necessary to admit here. 1) To ensure the population remains vigilant on every modular structure which will prevent the system from descending into a bureaucratic nightmare, 2) To ensure the economies following the above structure not very large, so that it does not become impossible to run this whole system in an efficient manner and there is sufficient communication though rotating points of representation, to ensure nobody is lagging behind.
@@ArthurWahoowa Wasn't the point about ethics brought up by you first ? Anyways, I will stick to questions about implementation as that is what you seem too be interested in. "Entrepreneurship is important to Capitalism and the world not only because of innovation" - When did I say this ? I explicitly talked about ideas. I mentioned two kinds of ideas. If you have a third one I will be glad to hear about it. "Simply producing innovation by state-funded science does not really create more jobs" - Neither did I say that they directly do. What I claimed was that the scientific and technological advancements that come out of the public funded research, holds the core of the economy in terms of technology. "Research and safety are not the only two things investment is needed for" - I said this about the kind of society that I talked about not the existing one. In the existing economy the investors invest because they have the capital. In a society that I talked about surplus revenue will be a collective resource and decisions about investment, will also be collective. "This is why Stakeholder American Capitalism is so competitive according to the World Economic Forum, because it focuses on the stakeholder and generates massive profits as a result" - That is only a partial picture of the World Economic Forum's opinion on American Capitalism. Another is the one that comes up in the Global Inequality report by Oxfam. A rising inequality, rising gap between the rich and poor. Top 0.1% of the population has 22% of the wealth which is also what the bottom 90% has. This is a disaster of its own order and I think the Friedmanite model of focusing solely on maximizing dividends for investors is a major reason. Actually the gap had started increasing from late 70s with financial deregulation (Nixon's economic policy, dismantling the Breton Woods) in 1971, and started sky-rocketing with Regan scrapping the anti-trust laws in the 1980s. So American Capitalism is not a model anybody is looking for, it is a disaster that people are trying to avoid.
All the good mentioned here will likely be undone by man made climate change very soon. As a software developer I love the part about teaching coding skills for those who will work for pennies a day. All the manufacturing jobs are already gone, slowly destroying the established middle class in developed countries. Unregulated capitalism is the same thing as unregulated fire. It will burn everything to ashes.
At the heart of the debate over the merits of capitalism versus socialism is finding the right balance between protection of "human rights" and "property rights." We cannot even reach consensus over whether we have human rights, or whether all rights exist by contract with one another, by enforced agreed-upon laws. Then, there is a serious disagreement over what is and what is not private property. Is the planet and and what nature provides free of charge rightfully claimed as individual property? Or, is the planet our commons from which we produce tangible goods as our legitimate private property. Decades ago I discovered the writings of the American political economist Henry George. Anyone seeking a clear understanding of what our relationship with the planet is and ought to be under law should read Henry George.
Right. Not all the people are enterpreneurs by their nature. They are good executives, but only few can start a business. The executives will never earn more than their employers decide to pay. There is a gap between the 2, and it's ever-widening. It happens because a business owner can raise the cost of his product. But he doesn't care to proportionally raise the salary of his employees.
I have studied political philosophy for years now. And I have come to the conclusion that free-market laissez-faire capitalism, based on individual's rights, is the appropriate social system for human flourishing. If this is true, it will be true regardless of how much money a particular individual owns.
Maybe you didn't listen to the whole talk? The whole point is that by integrating doing good into every aspect of the business, the business, investors, and employees are also better off. This isn't a zero-sum game.
Workers are content with their wages. Otherwise, they would most likely quit or demand raises. Capitalism isn't stealing. It's a private agreement between an employer and an employee that benefits both sides.
You can't solve a problem with the tools that create it. Capitalism is inherently suicidal and must be replaced with an ethical and compassionate system which values life. The profit motive will always function in an ultimately destructive way.
Whatever “system” you live in, the self destruction follows when you impose your own interest at the expense of others. Profitability is not sustainable if you cheat or harm others. It’s not the system, it’s the people - working with or against those you agree or disagree with.
@@marksorensen4158 Profit IS cheating and harming others. It's literally the exploitation of workers to extract surplus labor for capital. THAT is the system. Individuals are only cogs in that machine. From top to bottom. The algorithm of profit maximization determines all action under capitalism. A just system is one where all aspects of life are democratically decided upon.
You can solve a problem with the tools that create it. Capitalism is an ethical and compassionate system which values life. The profit motive will always function in a creative way.
I honestly thought that Edgar was going to come out on stage at any moment and that he worked for the company now. Feels strange that he just checked up on him and then said see ya.
i know you had good intentions when you been teaching people in southeast asia how to pump up ground water.. but i live in bangkok... a city that sinks every day faster and might be under water soon, because people keep pumping up ground water from under the city :( When the day comes i have to replace my car with a boat, i will name that boat “Davis”...
You can be both! We all need help sometimes, we need someone to recognize our struggle and have compassion and empathy for us. We also all need to be that person for someone else sometimes. To reach out and help another person who has less then us
The problem with capitalism is that it encourages unnecessary production, excessive waste and pollution. This isn't ideal, but it is an inevitability no matter how much we slow it down. The death of Earth that is. That and the preservation of life being the saliant motivation behind an argument against capitalism. Of which, I still haven't heard a fix for in the long term. So in the mean time, I don't see why we should all suffer in the short term, sacrifice the benefits of capitalism for the negatives of social control. One thing that we can take away from the Edgar story, is if he had to use private property and apply for licenses before selling sweets and pay taxes on them afterwards you can bet his entrepreneurial abilities would've only got him so far.
I followed you all the way to: "I don't see why we should all suffer in the short term, sacrifice the benefits of capitalism for the negatives of social control." So I wonder what the benefits of Capitalism, and all the negatives of sosial control is. In Scandinavia we have it , the other way. We see Capitalism as not a free thing, like work. And our Welfare as something very positiv and Socialistic. Free Health Care, Free Education, 1 year Paid Maternity Leave, 5-8 weeks Paid Vacation etc But the first you wrote was as I would like to wright it myself.
@@sveingeraldhansen7275 Yeah I mean upon reading it back to myself, I was supposed to say "positives of social control", but I think you still understand the claim, you just find it difficult to understand my reasoning. The reason you see capitalism as not free, and social welfare as free speaks volumes. In reality it's the other way round. Capitalism is trade without restriction, to put it simply. Which is by definition, free! Socialism then applies specific law, policies, regulation, taxation etc to businesses/traders in order for it to work in the interests of everyone else. And I admit, social welfare appears to be free, but in order for you to receive a service for free, the person offering the service still needs to be paid. They don't work for nothing and that money needs to come from somewhere. And money is just a temporary token of trade, and just acts in replacement of actual man-hours. You can't just print more money to cover the demand from social welfare, that fucks it all up! The way I like to think of it is, rather than thinking of a whole country here, just imagine your home is the country and your dad represents the military, farming industry and agriculture, your mum represents the nurses and cleaners, your siblings cover other areas of trade; like waste disposal, building, DIY, car manufacturer etc etc etc and that's your country. Other households (for the sake of this analogy) are other countries. Within your country, you, as an independent trader may be able to do your 'thing' really well. You may be able to bake bread and build houses, or fix bikes etc etc. But when it comes to finding grain, or healing injuries, or protecting yourself against attack, you don't seem to fair as well as other people in "your country" do (e.g. dad). Equally those members may not be able to bake bread like you. So instead, everyone joins a team, so that in your case, you can protect yourself as well as you bake bread if that makes any sense. And for dad (aka the military), he can now bake bread at a level of excellence comparable to his expertise in combat. This is more efficient way of living for everyone. It means you don't spend 200 years (that you don't have) building your own iPhone when you want one. You essentially build it in a week without learning any additional skills! Now, lets do the same analogy again, but scale up to a site about the size of your old school. And add another 1000 people to the game. At this stage, it's great, we have more people, so more diverse products and services to offer. But, sometimes you have to travel a pretty long distances to find the service(s) you want. And so rather than trading one-on-one directly, product of value for product of value; we instead collectively agree to see value in an otherwise valueless, insignificant, cheap to make (but difficult to counterfeit) piece of paper as a way to make trade even more efficient. So in this (1000 strong) collective, we have a mixture of economically successful people and economically unsuccessful people. The latter who live a lower status, less luxurious lifestyle as a result of not have much to offer of value to anyone. Pretty understandable. People trade their man-hours for man-hours they desire. People don't buy things they don't want. People don't work for nothing. You can consider this so far as being a capitalist free-market economy, people are driven by lust, greed, power, social status, professional prestige etc etc etc. Those people, who remember create the economy and create the diverse range of products and services on offer, are in a socialist/social-democratic economy the people who are enabling those who would otherwise suffer as a result of their inabilities to instead do better, and in extreme cases live another day to vote on a policy which asks for more taxation (e.g. man-hours) for social services. This is the same as me doing nothing, and deciding that because you're really successful you should pay for my health. As nice as it sounds, there are flaws which need addressing. And just to be clear, socialism, for anyone who doesn't know, is the idea that while we're all part of a group with a common goal; business owners, producers and manufacturer's etc, who have worked hard to ensure their children live another day, must give up a control of the means in which their business operates, so that it meets the needs of everyone else. The customers, employees, local residence etc. This comes in the way of workplace policy and legislation, licenses, taxation, pension schemes, minimum wage etc. The UK system also comes with "free" healthcare and unemployment welfare. All these things which sound great from one side of the argument, but aren't often looked at from the other side. If you're simply a bread maker, it might not play on your mind that much, giving up half your freedoms and a percentage of your wealth for the benefit of "free" health care. But if you're a highly independent, highly successful and socially inept character (who's been tormented by highly social, highly popular people a lot in life), you might think to yourself "why are my life choices always dictated by the kind of intellectually lazy, unproductive, untalented, shallow-minded social conformists people like me are technically keeping alive? When I could be finding, doing and making everything I need to survive in some cave somewhere in complete solitude." You start thinking, why do we have a society and why do I have to be a part of it. This is the libertarian conservative view which is gaining a lot more traction now as people are starting to learn more about politics. Most people don't really think for themselves when it comes to politics and just feel like they've got to pick one. To add, most people don't even question the morality of authoritarian regimes, almost as if it never occurred to them that they have a right like anyone else to say "that shit's just not right" . Socialism is theft, via authoritarian government. "It's possible for 5 individuals to find their own wealth independently without being aggressive towards each other. That's independence, that's capitalism, that's conservatism! "It's not possible for 3 individuals to take the other 2 individuals wealth without aggression" That's theft by force, that's socialism, that's left-wing thinking today.
@@C.D.J.Burton Everyone pays for the welfare, it is paid by tax 32,2 % tax, for tax and Health Care, Free University, 1 year Paid Maternity Leave, and 5-8 weeks paid Vacation etc And we don`t have many that don`t want to work. Norwegians likes to work. And how can Socialism be a theft, Socialism is not a theft, but Capitalism is. How you can see The Capitalist getting much more money than the workers as fair. Look at US , almost all workers have a very hard life, while the Capitalist have endless money. And I had my own Company for 21 Years, so I know what I am talking about. You could make your company to AS. And then you were sure to not loose much money. And why we have a Society, is to improve the lives for everybody. That is what we try to do. Not to a few . And Norway , Sweden, Denmark with Social Democracy and a whole lot of benefits the Rich in USA don`t let the people in US have. So good luck with US Capitalism. It is a joke All around the World. For 4 dager siden I'm an American, living with my relatives in France for six months. If there's anything I've learned from my stay here, it's that, from the perspective of Europe, the US truly seems like a backwards country. BaronNolanvonStraya For 4 dager siden 4:41 When he says that other nations look at the US with pity it’s true. I’m from Australia and here we the general populace don’t view America as a shining beacon of democracy and freedom anymore, but instead as a squalid backwards country, a relic of a bygone era. I remember when one of my friends went to America on holidays and when she came back she told me that everything there just ‘felt poor’. Socialism 50 people buy a company together and democratically choose a leader. And the 50 OWNERS start working When they have worked and the income turns out, they share everything, equally. Capitalism: The same workplace and the same 50 people, but now they are only employees, not capitalists, only workers, the Capitalist can say and do whatever he wants , the workers must avoid problems with the capitalist or get fired (US) And now the Income , the workers have a fixed salary, and the Capitalist takes the rest, enough to earn a good profit for the Capitalist. Again in Socialism all the people owns. But in a Capitalist system 1 owns, and the rest is Workers, even if they should earn $ 5000 000 a year. USSR; Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , China, etc was dictatorships. And not Socialism. Socialism is a less rigid, more flexible ideology. Its adherents seek change and reform, but insist on making these changes through democratic processes within the existing social and political structure, not overthrowing that structure. Social democracy, the most common form of modern socialism, focuses on achieving social reforms and redistribution of wealth through democratic processes, and can co-exist alongside a free-market capitalist economy. Likewise, no country in history has achieved a state of pure socialism. Even countries that are considered socialist states, like Norway, Sweden and Denmark, have successful capitalist sectors, and follow policies that are largely aligned with social democracy.
The graph of poverty rates is misleading. In 1820 the World population was about 1 billion so about 0.94 billion people were living in poverty. In 1990 the World population was about 6 billion so just over 3 billion people were living in poverty. Hence, the number of people living in poverty had increased by a factor of more than 3.
Yep and the word poverty is defined to fit the needs of Capitalism. What was so bad about candles? or not having the NFL? or drinking from a river? Most people alive today were born for no other reason than to service Capitalism. Of course it will do its best to keep these feeders feeding.
The problem is that humans are living in such huge populations. We as a species were never meant to live like we are. The only way we could fix this would be if everyone significantly reduced their lifestyle to only acquiring things that they needed, rather than things that they want. But that will never happen, and so we will continue to spend decades upon decades trying to fix the problems that we create without realizing that we're creating the problem. It's like a hydra, you cut one head off and two more grow back. Idk if that makes sense but whatever
I don't personally believe the core issue is populations. Like you said it's lifestyles and consumerism (ofcourse exacerbated by large population) but this has been encouraged by capitalism. This has led to many by products like the climate and biodiversity crisis, pandemics, etc.
Capitalism doesn't make the world a better place. Individuals within it can, but capitalism is a system, not a person, and as a system in only encourages the worst kind of people.
Problem is there are two definitions of capitalism and it confuses people. One is people trading freely with each other. The other is a corrupt government concentrating wealth. These are not the same thing. One does not lead to the other. These two functions actually oppose each other.
Excellent theme... There danger in "...crass materialism, which lays excessive and everincreasing emphasis on material well-being, forgetful of those things of the spirit on which alone a sure and stable foundation can be laid for human society." ~ Shoghi Effendi, Baha'i Faith
The poverty chart from 1820 to the "present" showed a radical change in global poverty rates, largely resulting from Capitalism. The people who are still living in poverty will never go away. Why? Because until the present, government gave people the means and motivation to get themselves out of poverty. Now, government has stripped people in poverty of motivation to pull themselves out. Turns out that some politicians found that careers in Socialist politics can be very lucrative. So people in poverty now find that they can live comfortable lives entirely from government welfare. Why work to become self supporting? What a shame .
Capitalism (Marx opined that Capitalism was the quickest way to prosperity) or redistribution of wealth, neither are the answer to solve poverty. Poverty is the gradient needed to climb high, a formula ingrained into evolution, which has a mind of its own and brings prosperity only in small steps. But you are right, capitalism and free market economy brought prosperity to millions and brought even insurmountable problems with it, this is how the intelligent design of our existence works out. What is needed is a system that keeps the spirit of Edgar alive, while providing opportunity to sustainable honest karma and avoid the 1% to amass disproportionate accumulation of wealth, only if taxed 90% like FDR or Eisenhower, to create opportunities.
A 'self-justifying' speech that annoyed me from the beginning. It is very obvious that this rich man was purely interested in justifying his wealth, whilst pretending that he was 'a force for good'. He provided a tiny amount of help to help poor people in other (far poorer....) countries, but never mentioned whether he was paying his poorest employees a living wage in the US.
The height of this talk for me was when the speaker told about many good things they managed to achieve while for them as a business this "costed them nothing". So there ovbiously is a way for capitalists to do a lot of good, without hurting their bottom line. But they have so little desire to do so, that even the possibility of it happening is presented as a discovery worth of a talk. And this is the greatest indicator that capitalism is broken and should be replaced with a better system. Because making lives of people better just because you can and it doesn't cost you anything is not how capitalism operates. More often it operates by making lives of few people better, by making lives of many people worse, while extracting as much profit as possible. Like this touching story about the boy opening a tiny business to support nis family... Why nobody asked the question which circumstances put this childs family into a position where parents can't support their children? I Highly doubt that they are not working their asses off.
Exactly, they are confusing capitalism with crony capitalism or corporatism. Capitalism raises everybody up, and gives an enormous boost to the economy. Products are cheaper and everything is better quality. Monopolies are by definition not possible under capitalism.
We are not confusing. markets tend to not stay free for long. If there's competition, there will be losers and winners. Losers go out of business, winners acquire (semi-)monopolies.
In our world politics dictates economic outcomes. What we refer to as "democracy" requires examination. Are the processing of governing participatory, representative or delegated, or some combination of all three? How are individuals chosen to serve in public office? Do the systems of law, regulation and taxation meet objective tests of justice? Or, do these systemic forces secure and protect monopolistic privileges that result in the redistribution of wealth from producers to non-producing "rentier" interests? Is there an appropriate balance under law between the protection of property and human rights? What, in fact, is property? What we produce with our labor (and whatever capital goods we own) is surely our property. What about nature? Nature is not produced by any person. Land and natural resources are provided to us free of charge. Do some have a greater claim on nature than others? If so, what is the principle involved? None of these issues has been resolved by human societies as the centuries have come and gone. The philosopher Mortimer J. Adler suggested that the extent to which just law, justly enforced, exists in a society is whether the overwhelming majority of citizens have access to the goods of decent human existence. if many people do not, one can logically conclude that there is serious injustice at play. Many thoughtful intellectuals have offered an analysis of how and why some (whether a majority or just a significant minority) have not enough when others have far more than needed. The person I have come to believe offers the greatest insights and most practical solutions was the 19th century political economy Henry George. Every thoughtful person would benefit from reading his 1879 book "Progress and Poverty." This book, which has sold millions of copies since it was first published and has been translated into almost every language, brought people as diverse as Leo Tolstoy, Albert Einstein, Sun Yat-Sen, and John Dewey to devote much of their energy to bringing Henry George's vision of the just society to reality.
Umm... Maby the actual concept of poverty has changed during the last 200 years. And just maybe the value of money has changed too. It's also a possibility that people used to farm their own food back in the day and people didn't actually need a credit card to survive from everyday life. This guy is a total joke.
Well we have whole third world countries that are still in agriculture economy where concept of poverty haven't changed during 200 years The only reason why capitalism beat poverty that poverty can be beat only by producing Like famine can be beat only by food Capitalism let people make businesses, produce products to make a profit
@@ХейХей-ю3ф capitalism isn't pro-producing nor pro-availability. capitalism is pro-capital and pro-profit (for the business owners), these things aren't interconnected to the ones I mentioned before. for example the agriculture business isn't maximizing their production or trying to beat world hunger, they maximize their profit by meeting their consumers demand with the highest possible profit. giving agriculture industry as an example since you mentioned food, the agriculture issue isn't under-producing but mostly over-producing, they try to meet their consumers demand and reduce food wastage while maximizing profit. despite the fact that the market actually needs more food, and our technology can easily meet their demands, capitalism refuses it. another thing is that, agriculture industry is 95% automated and we're moving into 100% automated already. yet the prices of food remain the same as always. because the price isn't set based on how much work you've done but the market demand of your products. as long as people demand and eat food, it'll always be capital. essentially the agriculture farm owners have a money-farming machine that generates capital for them forever and as long as people eat. capitalism isn't 'make business xd'. capitalism is the privatization of the means of production exclusively towards the owners. the means of production nowadays are 'human resources'. R&D, tech industry, medicine, schools, and almost all industries, the most important factor is human resources by far. big corporations require their workers to constantly innovate to create and improve the products while the workers can even earn 10% of the profit of what they're creating, the profit goes to the business owner even if the owner does absolutely nothing and just leeches of the profit.
We've become so dependent on the medical industry, technology, chain supermarkets... they can do what they want and we either comply or go without. We need to rethink what we comply with why we do so.
Tom's Shoes! Hahahaha, that's some excellent research you've done schmuck. Love these 'entrepreneurs' talk about how business is the holy grail of doing everything right. The only solution is business! What BS. Business is good at making a profit, even, or losing money since profit is not guaranteed (much to the annoyance of business owners). Capitalism is a million losers and one winner, that's it's definition no matter how they want to spin it.
Everyone is a winner in capitalism. Are you saying that there are only 7,000 people in the world that have are winners? I think the majority of the population are probably happy with their life, and thus believe they are winners
@Cheri Merchant capitalism is the best economic system that has ever been created. Not just for the people at the top, but it betters the lives of nearly everyone in it, in some way or another
@@malachymoreland7417 Hey buddy, take a look at the environment. Go to China, they're much more successful at capitalism. Go work at Amazon, are you a winner? Million dollars for a house? Jobs that are increasingly low-wage, whilst you got jobs that don't provide a better way to live, but profit? What about the children that are mentally disabled in mathematics? Our education? Our youth?
His story would have really moved me if I heard Mr. Ekman DID something to change Edgar’s life; whether build him a humble Adobe house, build him a letrine or buy him a low priced toilet for the Adobe house. You see, to me this narrative is incomplete.
Unlucky_Spoon a less comfortable life, one in which company's can't triumph over the health of the planet, or its inhabitants. Socialism comes to mind.
Unlucky_Spoon right, in order to prevent a ruling class everyone should become more equal. Everyone works toward a common goal and therefore community becomes richer. The government can put forth regulations for companies to prevent excessive waste products. But really we got to stop relying on oil (gas, fuel, plastics) and move toward cleaner fuels. This is a world issue which cannot be easily solved. I think we'll get there eventually.
@@chelseab5467 I believe the answers are to continue to educate yourself, spread awareness, and mobilise as a population, and collectively rise up. I get that the 'rise up' part is vague, but that's because the answer isn't one that's simple, quick and definitive. We need to say goodbye to our pride and resist the systems, put pressure on them. There are many ways to do this that I am still learning, but there are also many activists and resources that can help. All we need is to get rid of our pride, and be inspired and determined. There is no quick and easy answer, radical collective action is what it'll take.
I prefer to be a little skeptical about this theory: that capitalism can be good if used and understood in a good way. I´m definitely not sure about it. I think that even if each business in the world work, in some way, to the community it is part of, the world will continue being a place full of poor and starving people. The problem is in the structure. Doing what this guy is saying will just mask the troubles caused by capitalism. We have to change the structure. We have to think of another way humans could live without explore other´s work.
His interpretation of the statistics is counter intuitive to me. I don't think it's possible to say that the billion people who are not in poverty are the same people who were in poverty. The people who were impoverished back then could have died and then been replaced by people born into better off places/families. No?
What I propose is to create a new form of government that takes the good things about capitalism and the good things about communism and mix them together.
Isnt that what capitalism does?, take other peoples labour and money just because you bought a few shares, or underpay just because the employees are not able to ask their labours worth.
@@davidemmyg no, under capitalism, you are not "taking other people's labour or money", if you hire me to sell some of your products, the profit shouldn't go to me. You take the financial risk of starting a business, and I opted for a more financially secure job for less pay. People only work for what they think their labour is worth. Guess what, if you work for $5/hr, it's because you think that's all your labour is worth. You choose to work for a company, you choose to not set up a business, you choose to not invest. Capitalism is about choice. Marxism is about coercion
The problem with a particular economic system is what goals it incentivizes. Whatever that goal is, it will displace goals that would interfere with achieving it.
Carlos Spicyweiner - Great point. Technological development and modern capitalism are inextricably linked. Plenty written on the subject. You really can't do one well without the other.
NASA says that the reason we haven't yet gone to Mars is because of only one reason, COST. Company discovered technologies (ie pharmaceuticals) being hidden from the public, or cures that could save lives now are drawn out over immense times to increase profit, as, it would be at too great a COST. The reason for not cleaning up any of the Earths pollution, nor promoting many environmental break-throughs, is because of COST. Over 87% of scientists (you know, the ones that actually contribute to science and technological advancements) say that they are under funded more and more every year due to COST. The entire health insurance scenario, in splinters because of COST. Less students going to school every year, meaning less educated individuals to create new technologies now because of COST. Want me to go on ... ? "You really can't do one well without the other."
Technology advances are possible due to higher education which is funded by tax money. Capitalism has nothing to do with it. Example: USSR had great technology at its time.
Where does tax money come from? The citizens and their businesses correct? If those citizens and businesses do not have an environment in which to thrive, they create less wealth, which limits their ability to pay for natural, human, and technological resources. Then their business cannot keep up with global competition that may have better environment, and therefore better access to resources (human, natural, technological). The USSR had great technology, because they were determined to spend their time, energy, and country's resources on developing that technology. The US spent the same energy, time and resources, but not at the detriment of their countries well being. The USSR collapsed, in part, because it (government) didn't know how to best use limited resources, yet it was still determined to have the government manage those resources. Had the USSR seen the US's thriving suburban life, they would have known sooner that their communist economy was a failure.
Most of these are subsidized by government. Subsidizations increase demand, thus increasing the price of a commodity, service, etc. To use a free enterprise philosophy as a proxy for a regulated one is utterly fallacious.
Inequality is the inevitable consequence of unregulated capitalism. Guaranteed, every time. This is not the fault of capitalism, the monster is is what it is. It's the fault of society and the the fact that they elect capitalists to represent what should be the balancing factor of the equation to ....capitalism...
That's great dad he did this but the system fundamentally puts profit and the growth of it overall, things like this just aren't encouraged and won't happen.
When people owns more goods/services than they can use and they want even more, what they are really seeking is power. Power to control others. They become small states themselves. I think he is a good guy but I don't believe in the system he seems to believe.
there is no reason for poverty. if people are poor, its their own faults. there is likely enough jobs for peole but not enough jobs in one particular business that gives superior income that everyone wants to be part of one and the same jobs. its also that poor people are just as greedy as rich people. they don't want to move away from their city into places where they can get job and house. if there was delicious cake in front of people and and stinky one next to it, everyone would want the delicious one and not the stinky one. people wan't to live an work and have house in rich places rather than poor places even if they themselves are poor. peole don't like to move around. they wan't to say where they are. this is the real problem. its also a problem for businesses as they too don't like to make money out poor places and like more central locations of their business. if you are resoruceful and can be happy by living in a poor place and create value and resources out of that, you can create jobs or just get a job that will give you money for a home and food on the table. if people realized that all rich cities have been on ground that once in the past was barren land devoid of life, they would understand that there is no excuse for their poverty other than their own fault.
Why? Money is just a tool, a means of exchange. Any and all civilizations have used some form of money. Primitive tribes used salt, sea shells, silver and gold, and of course, paper money. That is like wanting to solve world hunger by getting rid of food. "If there was no food, no one would need food, thus hunger would disappear".
@@johndough23 You are right, the FIAT money we use right now is based on nothing but promise of payment (debt); but that does not mean that all money must be of that nature. As I mentioned, people can (and have) use other objects as money, such as salt, seashells, gold and bitcoin, which are not necessarily based solely on promise of payment. .
@@AbhishekRoy-eh5wz It is hard to respond to this without knowing you personally, but still I will try. As far as the question of ethics is concerned I think what happens currently (the tax system) is precisely this. So I would like to know how you feel about that. And in terms of economics it was John Maynard Keynes who said that and automated surplus recycling mechanism is what is required to prevent economic crisis any further, because if surplus is left to the capitalists their natural way of employing it would not be with the interest of the society as a whole.
@@aniruddhasarkar2409 r u pointing out that capitalist pay less tax ?? Ok let me just assume that you r a student and your parents work in big company . Let's calculate then capitalist first have to pay 1.20-25% of their personal income as tax 2.Then their major chunk goes in salary payment of workers . 3. After that they have many taxes -taxes of each state ,taxes of central government , land tax , factory hoarding tax ,taxes on international profit , dockyard operation tax ,import duties and many more which normal tax system don't recognise and people say middle class and Poors only pay taxes . In comparison to those taxes how many taxes your parents pay ? (Income tax , charity tax ,epf tax more than that I don't think they pay taxes ) 4 . If capitalist hold money then they employ thousands of people give them job , salary , money etc . I don't think you will ignore that . 5 . If a person is poor it's his own fault not that capitalist bcz open market give everyone equal chance to take big risk in life and earn more . Ambani family Adani family kheda groud , Aditya birla group all were from humble background only . Free market don't discriminate anyone . 6 . Capitalism give power and prosperity socialism give corruption . Best example of capitalism is usa uk japan south Korea isreal . Capitalism removes poverty . Nobody is saying poor boy to stay poor ,if he will think big , dream big , take risk in life , work hard he will get whatever position he want .if money earned by poor people has value then surely money of rich people also has value . Both earn money by hard work diffence is appetite of taking risk .
@@AbhishekRoy-eh5wz Firstly, you misunderstood me. I didn't say that capitalists don't pay taxes. Rather, as you said, robbing from the rich and redistributing their money is unethical, I asked you what you think about our tax system, because the tax system does precisely that, takes a part of capitalist's surplus and use it for social welfare and development. By the way, asking a poor person to take risk is not very different from asking any human being to fly. It is meaningless. Just like the human being lacks the apparatus required for flying (wings) the poor person lacks the apparatus required for taking risk (capital). There are many other things wrong with what you said, but first I would like to look at your response about taxes, which you ostensibly speak so dearly of.
@@aniruddhasarkar2409 I don't think its problem of tax system but more of government policies and its attitude of implementation of those . All those capitalist were from humble background only .so it's all dependent that on how much anyone want to work hard . And I didn't said obstensibly but truth only as many of my family members r entrepreneurs so I know what tax government take from international players , big giants , small budding businesses .
" What had been an alleged ideal is now a ragged skeleton rattling like a scarecrow in the wind over the whole world , the grinning skull under the bloody rags. That skeleton is socialism. " -Ayn Rand-
We are proud of Capitalism and the change has done in the world for humanity without it numbers of poor people today could increase out of control.. Capitalism need to be controlled from monopoly & debt only... Dear come and visit dubai and see what Capitalism has done by changing died desert land(no rain no food) into one of most tourist country in the world and in rich its people....Dear think✌
Not only Dubai, Singapore also. Meanwhile my country India, with immense resources opted for nationalisation of resources. Until 1980's, India was pretty much socialism. After a more capitalistic approach, India is one of the fastest growing economies
Thank you. Your life experiences that you share with us in this video are very moving. Also, you have pleasant calm voice and appearance. I'm sure the audience will agree. I will be looking forward to the TED TALK You give in the future. 😊
Well, the story with Edgar was touching. But you can't depend on some "good" companies or people to change the inequality rates. By the time the system it's self promotes the limitless production of wealth, there will always be greedy people that keep destroying communities and the planet. It's simply inevitable. Goodhearted millionaires aren't the ones that will save us.
Poverty seems to be something to deal with money. People who don't have enough money is on the list. But in the 1800(s), money it's not that important , people made food their own, so money that time it's something you don't have enough to buy food, but you still have enough food to survive, food that time is the only important. But capitalism made money is more important. So it seems like poor people are richer and richer but they actually have more money and less food.
Since Capitalism was first thought of. Any country that has embraced Capitalist policies has a better general standard of living than any Medieval King.
Capitalism has moved the majority of the world who endorses it from farming to industry. Instead of people relying on food production they can move to more important things
Tomato Pa Crony capitalism brought greater inequality. Capitalism does the opposite- it literally raises the people from the bottom and generates mass ammounts of wealth that come down to the poor through jobs created by the rich. What do you think capitalism means?
eleven points to the solution! - upper financial limit for all! Everything above this limit is taxed at 100%. eg. at 300 million fr. to draw a limit for individuals. that would have far-reaching benefits. - insane basic income! that does not mean completely unconscious. a model in which everyone from 18 years onwards gets paid regardless of their salary. the reason for this is that nationality must be switzerland, one must pursue an activity and or do something for the common good. at least once a week. eg. collecting waste in the street, caring for someone, ect. - a money transfer tax! In the world of finance, billions of euros are pushed back and forth in fractions of a second via the internet every day. because of speculation on the stock exchange and so on. so the speculation is contained and incidentally, there are tax receipts in a gigantic amount of the general good. So the basic income can be easily financed. - absolute financial transferability for every politician! this ensures that the politician works for the benefit of the population. and not in the interest of a few less rich. - a sugar tax! By now, most foods contain sugar or other sweeteners that are harmful to your health and addictive. -a very strict ban on lobbyism! There are many interest groups in the government (banks, industries, large corporations) that steer politics in their favor. -minimum wage! a minimum hourly wage that is generally binding. you have to be able to live from your work. -A percentage of profit for each employee of a company at the end of the year! Every employee of a company has worked to make a company profitable. Without the work of a co-leader, there can be no profit in a company. By the way, the employees are also motivated. - Concrete regulations for affordable living space! There is less and less affordable living space. a flat is vital. and you can only choose limited where you want to live because of the work. every 5 years must be at least 10'000fr. be invested in a flat directly. otherwise the mietzins automatically drops by 50%. down to the pure maintenance costs of the apartment. which must be meticulously documented. to the maintenance costs without investment may not exceed 300fr. additional income per month. - a bank is liable as a whole for the assets entrusted a bank may only trade real money! Bank members can be expropriated in case of losses in order to pay back the people they saved. In this way, the general public is not liable for taxpayers' money losses. nor can the bank cadre still stuff his pockets with taxpayers' money. media law! division of the 4th violence. All media must inevitably be divided into at least 8 parties. There must be no connection between the respective parties. otherwise, this leads to the expropriation of the respective parties, the withdrawal of the media license and to a complete redistribution of the companies concerned.
James, great question. I've debated for the last 18 months how to best help Edgar. Hiring him and bringing him to the US was obviously one of my first thoughts, but the more I explored this, it wasn't the right solution. He has younger siblings he is raising there, and he is Peruvian. The answer isn't to bring everyone who is suffering to the US. Instead, I'm helping him pay for a 3-year program where he is learning to be a tour guide. This is something he enjoys, has natural talents/abilities for, and will sustainably allow him to support his own family. I'm already working with him on what it might look like to start his own business in the tourism sector.
Davis Smith that sounds good. Teach a man to fish. I hope he sticks with it. Maybe he can be a consultant for South American markets. Who knows. Glad you could help him.
I think if we ‘rescue’ all people living in poverty by removing them from their communities, it becomes cultural genocide. We need to help them come up with their own solutions.
Ehhhhh, talking about eye care lexotica has a monopoly on the entire eye industry, and toms helps destroy the African cobblers. so....It's kinda like the american constitution, we talk a big game but sometimes don't live up to that. It's a good place to put the bar though, aim for the top, even if you miss you'll land somewhere close.
never trust him if he is making millions and millions because that simply means which use this so called helping people as a marketing tool , and have nothing to do with people its a cunning practice
The only way to be rich under capitalism is to benefit lots and lots of people's lives by giving the consumer a product they want, and value more than their money. (Voluntary exchange of goods via private person)
Looks like somebody missed economics class. Think about how absurd it is that we are the only species alive who know that 99.9% of species to have ever existed on this earth are now extinct. Let that sink in.
@@cohlinegarnet8313 Irony is so flipping crazy because I paid someone to take my online English 1302. I didn't have to log in one time but i got the credit. I also did not find it "absurd" because we were both better off as a result of our contract. For $500 I was able continue and finish college. Translation: You are not paying to live on this planet, you are paying for someone to provide you with a good or service. You trade your "Capital" (knowledge, skills, labor, experience, talent etc.) for money 💰. Then you are able to spend your 💰 on someone else's good/service that you value more than that money you worked for. If that good or service wasn't worth it, then I suspect you would not trade your money.
Nice thought, businisess with social responsinility, i beöieve in that, but capitlalism essence is the profit!! I think a combined sociaity between capitalism and socialism is the way. More laws to big cororations!! Its unaceptable that corporations like Amazon doesent pay any taxes!!!
Evandro Lima if we agree on what we all want to put money into and we all put in a percentage. Then we ALL benefit. Its not rocket science. Property values in certain neighborhoods are high. They are able to pay for better schools and other resources. *in theory* though many people use property taxes as a means of keeping certain people out. However, if you are a business and you get tax right offs in a neighborhood because you employ 100 people. It should in theory help. More people are employed, yet the taxes are high, they are employed. The minimum wage is still stagnant, but people are employed. 15 dollars an hour full time for 100 people should equal or be greater than the amount of tax right offs...because if not schools and everything else covered by property taxes, suffer.
You are confusing capitalism with crony capitalism or corporatism. Capitalism raises everybody up, and gives an enormous boost to the economy. Products are cheaper and everything is better quality. Monopolies are by definition not possible under capitalism.
Derricks you don’t have to. Start a business. Be great. Make a commodity. The point of capitalism is that people compete to make groundbreaking technological advances that the leads to the furthering of human living standards. Competition breeds greatness, and in the fire of aforementioned competition we will advance faster than any other system.
While exploitation does occur, the left does want to tax average Americans more. That has been proven, time and time again. Whether its small-scale in California, New York, Chicago, or wide-scale in the United States. Taxing the top 1% 50%+ of their income does not solve issues, nor will it solve poverty issues at a lower-income scale as that money will not trickle to them, but to our government. The reason people aren't voting for Democrats is because you guys aren't providing any real results. If it was up to me, if you make under $50K/year, your tax should be all of 5% or less. It can scale upward, but just saying "OH, this man is successful, he worked hard and makes millions a year, we should tax him 50%" isn't a solution. Its just bias. I don't want to be penalized for being above average and successful, but I also don't want to hinder those below me. Think about that.
is not capitalism or socialism... the issue is the human heart... The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? Jeremiah 17:9 Jesus can give us new heart... heart towards God and a heart toward each other.
Dont listen to them. They are all ignorants. Capitalism is actually very simple: homesteading , producing and exchanging. Person A produces something , Person B produces other thing , Person A prefers what B has produced in turn of what itself produced. So they exchange and everyone is happy!
Modern capitalism is based on the following things (to my knowledge): A lawful state that defines property rights and how economic behaviour is organised. Legal security, which gives the safety required to move capital freely Property rights, whcih include wealth that generates more wealth. Large parts of the economic production are owned by private organisations. This is basically it, depending on how the state and the people behave you can have different results, from a corrupted oligarchy to a modern welfare state like Norway. It has proven to be often very effective in lifting developing countries out of poverty, e.g. South Korea and Japan are good examples for that.
*** You say there was 94% poverty in 1820, in relation to what? What do you define as poverty? Today I see substantial poverty(scarcity) of time as competition heats up around the world. I define poverty as being unable to shelter, cloth, and feed yourself with your daily wages or labor or having to labor 12 hours plus per day to afford the basics of life. Today, I see countries like India and China where the average factory worker has to slave away for 12 plus hours per day to afford the basics, but somehow this would be seen as progress, and that they are lifted out of poverty because they have a steady wage and the basics of life. Where my wife is from(Peru) they use to raise their own beef, and poultry on a ranch and grow all their own fresh food, but today most of her brothers and sisters seeking a life in the city have now ended up needing to work more than 12 hours per day 7 days a week to afford the high cost of city living when before all they had to do was bust their ass on the farm for 10 hours a day 7 days a week for 8 months of the year, and have 4 months to take it easy with only 4 hours of work a day(post harvest season). I think they are poorer for making this choice as they now have to work longer hours just to make someone else richer, and the quality of their food has gone down, their privacy, pollution, and insecurity from crime, and threat of being fired. Do you really call this typical 3rd world country situation for the average worker being lifted out of poverty? That is bullshit***
This is the best talk I have seen on Ted x so far... I am speechless. This makes me so happy! I totally agree on the matter of whether capitalism is good or bad. capitalism is good if being used the right way. we need more people like Davis Smith in this world!
Teun Donk All humans are born with different capacities. If everybody is free, they are not equal. If everybody is equal, they are not free. What is more important? Freedom or equality?
I hate this type of capitalism the most!!!!! He sells his cheap products to get a huge profit while at the same time making his company brand look good by giving free (cheap) stuff to the people in those poor area. It might look good in the front but in the back it is ruining those specific type of businesses in that country. So he is pretty much destroying his competition while making his brand look good. He is not helping them, but instead he is keeping them a poor country for a long time. If you want to really help them you invest in their economy so their country can be richer. As country gets richer so does poverty.
Businesses, under capitalism, have one objective that overrides everything else: to grow capital. That's the core of the definition of capitalism. If you override that essential of the system, it's no longer capitalism.
And the people decide if the campany growth increse or decrese
That is true. But "how much growth is desired" is different among businessmen. Also, having the goal of growing capital does not mean that they are willing to do anything to achieve that goal. Most businessmen I know wouldn't hurt children, even if that would somehow increase their wealth.
Business has nothing to do with capitalism
Tien Doan Explain?
@@tiendoan1333 but thats why Capitalism exist because of businesses
except it used to be that with a little land and almost no income you could make and provide for yourself and your family- food, meat timber, extra to sell or to barter... horses that grew on your place and eat grass.. that doesnt work any longer
Capitalism and Socialism are powerful tools that can be used by responsible people to do good things for a community, whether that community is local, national or world-wide. They can also be used by predators to do harmful things to a community for personal gain. Capitalism can be used to raise money to build an industry that will keep a community safely and sustainably employed for many generations. Or, it can be used by predators to buy up a community's resources so that those predators can harvest the community's resources as fast and cheap as possible, flip the leftovers to another predator, then disappear leaving the cleanup to a devastated community. Socialism is a tool that can be used to make sure all the members of a community are safely housed, fed, clothed and healthy in a nurturing society. Or, it can be used to take away all those things by powerful control-freak leaders.
You basically resumed the issues with both sistems
welp my families home country is socialist technically and most of the people are below the poverty line so.... yeah I agree with the last statement.
"Socialism is great until you run out of other people's money"
-Margret Thatcher-
@Cheri Merchant Capitalism is the free exchange between consenting parties under a universal rule of law. No system ever created has lifted more people out of poverty quicker than free market capitalism. Nobody it taking anything from anyone else without their consent so were do you get the impression that capitalism takes anything away from anyone to the point of homelessness??? You seem to be equating slavery for capitalism in your description.
And what is the usual result seen with Capitalism and Socialism?
"Who is your Edgar, and what can you do to make the world a better place?" Counter-question: Does it matter what I do when I don't have any capital to do anything about it? I feel like it's always the case, where people defend capitalism on the basis of some people doing good with it, when by its very nature the people with the most power in capitalism are the ones who do not have good intentions. I'm glad I watched, but before I agree with him I would like him to approach other economic systems and explain why they are not viable.
Capitalism IS the only socioeconomic model that has PROVEN to pull more people out of poverty than any other model. One can read many books written by educated people who favors Socialism or Communism, or attend a humanities or economics class in college taught by a Socialist or Communist professor, and become persuaded by their indoctrination. Their #1 excuse for the failure of Socialism or Communism in a country is that “the model was poorly or incorrectly implemented”. The same can be said of Free Market, Freedom of Commerce, or Free Trade (Capitalism is the derogatory title by Marx), yet, to this day and as I said, is the ONLY socioeconomic model that has removed the most people out of poverty.
It is quite the opposite under Socialism and Communism: under both models, the leadership (usually a dictatorship, a military regime) is the only people who are raised out of poverty, for the collect the money from its people to keep it for themselves and live a life of opulence. And, while the leaders of those countries are wearing Golden Goose or Roger Vivier tennis shoes, and Armani suits, the people are living in EQUALITY… all equally poor and miserable. Check for yourself and tell me of any Socialist or Communist leader who lives within the means as the rest of the country.
*Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez’s worth = $2 Billion.
*Cuba’s Fidel Castro’s worth = $900 Million.
*Soviet Union’s Joseph Stalin’s worth = counted in the Billions of Dollars.
*Russia’s Vladimir Putin’s worth = so far, $200 Billion.
*China’s Mao Zedong’s worth = $1 Billion.
*China’s XI Jinping’s worth = $1.2 Billion.
*North Korea’s Kim Jong Un’s net worth = $5 Billion.
In our Republic of the United States, a Presidents’ salary = $400 Thousand/year. Many government officials (including the other branches of government) are worth millions because the own businesses or have heavily invested in commodities.
Capitalism has never failed. That being said, some capitalists have abused the system, but that, in no ways means it is a failed model.
This guy does not convince me one bit, especially after he went back to Edgar's story. Isn't Edgar in his miserable situation die to capitalism. This guy is saying capitalism works with good people. Well that's a dilema, isn't it..
I wonder if he included infilation rates at the chart at 4:15. Because 60$ a month in 1913 equals 1459$ in 2016. So you can't say people earning like 1.90$ a day was living in poverty. Anyone dare to explain?
Yes, these numbers account for inflation. The data reference is at the bottom of the slide. :)
Of course it does thats by real ppp and not nominal
If you live somewhere that the cost of food is $2 a week, shelter, clothing and any other necessities an other $2 dollar a week. So earn $6 a week, spend $4, you are not in poverty. ( Utopia ). If where you live it costs $40 a week for food, $50 for shelter, clothes etc an extra $20 then $13 a day is below poverty.
If the cost of living is higher than the rate of pay, that is poverty.
A different direction:- In country A, the worker earns $10 a day, but living costs $5 a day.
In country B the worker earns $20 a day but living costs $15 a day.
Who is better off, they are saving the same amount each week but the cost of living in country B is 3 time more, it will take 3 times longer to save up for those new shoes as these ones have cardboard inside as the tread.
Is this a TED talk or a commercial? I can't really tell.
Lol thank you!! And to that commercial what about all the homeless and poor in America, Canada or any other country?
I like the part when he said:"and it didn't cost our company ..." Employers and other volunteered... bljak.
Thank you someone else with common sense. I've missed you how are you my fellow human being?
Little dramatic but common sense is hard to find these days. But seriously thank you.
Toms shoes actually puts local shoe makers out of business.
Yes, this is true from about 7 years ago. They have completely shifted their giving strategy years ago and that specific unintended consequence is no longer happening. It's certainly easy to criticize and cast stones, but I give TOMS props for taking risks, giving away profits to help others, and inspiring thousands of entrepreneurs to think beyond making profits and instead look for ways to make this world a little better.
@@ArthurWahoowa The profiteering model should be abandoned in favor of an economic system that servers the needs of the people rather than arbitrary stock exchanges.
A good start would to replace CEOs with workers making direct decisions about how to operate within their industry.
@@ArthurWahoowa How do you know that the CEOs have the benevolence and altruism to work for the society effectively and prioritize social well being over personal gains ? And, is it ethical to keep workers working for you at fixed wages when production, distribution, stock price everything is variable. In other words, a labor market surely needs labor, but what we have to ask ourselves is, does it need wealthy labor, is the laborers becoming as rich as the owners, beneficial to the consumers of the market, the owners of the company ?
The company runs on production and distribution of whatever product or service it offers, in which the workers play a major role and obviously the most important role. The decisions that are taken are important but if the information and expertise, modularized using the same principles are available to the workers there is no reason to believe that they will not able to take decisions collectively, obviously through discussions and debates, I mean democratically.
Finally to respond to the last sentence, I would just ask a simple question. Is their labor their property ? If yes, then the produce of that labor and the profits are their property too. If no, they are slaves.
@@ArthurWahoowa As you have jumped directly to questions about implementation I would assume you agree with me about the conclusion that the current system is morally unviable for the reasons I mentioned.
I think by democratic workplace you mean one that would exist with the rest of the economy being exactly the same. Though I don't have a problem with someone trying that out, I don't think such an experiment has any prospect of success. The ones that I am aware of are either too small or with increase in size and scale has become more hierarchical and less democratic, as a response to string market forces.
While writing my first comment what I had in mind was a society more or less devoid of wage earners. One that consists of either private people (who are not willing to economically interact with the society for whatever reasons), or people who work in democratic workplaces. Now considering this, let me respond to your apprehensions.
Problem 1: Entrepreneurship cease to happen
Lets see why entrepreneurship is so important to capitalism. It is important, as it brings to the fore new solutions to problems existing with current system or solutions to new problems, satisfying a new need which nobody might have ever thought of before.
Firstly, if somebody can spot an inefficiency with the existing system in a democratic framework it can come to the fore much more easily, because the whole process of taking risk in a market place, which requires with idea, capital as well won't be required in this framework. Whoever has a better idea or a concern can just be raised in a council meeting and then it can be discussed, debated and finally evaluated though a referendum. Obviously in real world the process will be a bit more complicated, we can discuss much more of the details if you are interested.
Secondly, solving new problem is precisely based on scientific advancement which requires huge amount of funding for research, hoping something comes out of that which can have real world applications. Now contrary to popular belief a major portion of the modern dynamic economy is based on research funded by our previous generations, not entrepreneurship. And given the funding and good quality education this won't be a problem.
Additionally I think one thing a system like this will be particularly good at is responding to real human demands as they won't be manufactured and distorted through advertisements.
Problem 2: Investment will cease
The whole thing about investment has to do will surplus. As in an economy like this research and precautionary safety measures are the two things that require investment on, surplus can be generated through production to meet these demands.
Now two things I think are necessary to admit here. 1) To ensure the population remains vigilant on every modular structure which will prevent the system from descending into a bureaucratic nightmare, 2) To ensure the economies following the above structure not very large, so that it does not become impossible to run this whole system in an efficient manner and there is sufficient communication though rotating points of representation, to ensure nobody is lagging behind.
@@ArthurWahoowa Wasn't the point about ethics brought up by you first ? Anyways, I will stick to questions about implementation as that is what you seem too be interested in.
"Entrepreneurship is important to Capitalism and the world not only because of innovation" - When did I say this ? I explicitly talked about ideas. I mentioned two kinds of ideas. If you have a third one I will be glad to hear about it.
"Simply producing innovation by state-funded science does not really create more jobs" - Neither did I say that they directly do. What I claimed was that the scientific and technological advancements that come out of the public funded research, holds the core of the economy in terms of technology.
"Research and safety are not the only two things investment is needed for" - I said this about the kind of society that I talked about not the existing one. In the existing economy the investors invest because they have the capital. In a society that I talked about surplus revenue will be a collective resource and decisions about investment, will also be collective.
"This is why Stakeholder American Capitalism is so competitive according to the World Economic Forum, because it focuses on the stakeholder and generates massive profits as a result" - That is only a partial picture of the World Economic Forum's opinion on American Capitalism. Another is the one that comes up in the Global Inequality report by Oxfam. A rising inequality, rising gap between the rich and poor. Top 0.1% of the population has 22% of the wealth which is also what the bottom 90% has. This is a disaster of its own order and I think the Friedmanite model of focusing solely on maximizing dividends for investors is a major reason. Actually the gap had started increasing from late 70s with financial deregulation (Nixon's economic policy, dismantling the Breton Woods) in 1971, and started sky-rocketing with Regan scrapping the anti-trust laws in the 1980s. So American Capitalism is not a model anybody is looking for, it is a disaster that people are trying to avoid.
All the good mentioned here will likely be undone by man made climate change very soon. As a software developer I love the part about teaching coding skills for those who will work for pennies a day. All the manufacturing jobs are already gone, slowly destroying the established middle class in developed countries. Unregulated capitalism is the same thing as unregulated fire. It will burn everything to ashes.
Here in india its worse. But what can we do ? Revolt against the rich?
@@robbenvanpersie1562 Yes! The world needs a massive socialist revolution against the bourgeoisie!
At the heart of the debate over the merits of capitalism versus socialism is finding the right balance between protection of "human rights" and "property rights." We cannot even reach consensus over whether we have human rights, or whether all rights exist by contract with one another, by enforced agreed-upon laws. Then, there is a serious disagreement over what is and what is not private property. Is the planet and and what nature provides free of charge rightfully claimed as individual property? Or, is the planet our commons from which we produce tangible goods as our legitimate private property. Decades ago I discovered the writings of the American political economist Henry George. Anyone seeking a clear understanding of what our relationship with the planet is and ought to be under law should read Henry George.
The problems we face are systemic. A handful of morally conscious businesses will not fix the problems we face.
Right. Not all the people are enterpreneurs by their nature. They are good executives, but only few can start a business. The executives will never earn more than their employers decide to pay. There is a gap between the 2, and it's ever-widening. It happens because a business owner can raise the cost of his product. But he doesn't care to proportionally raise the salary of his employees.
It is not markets that have reduced poverty but fossil fuels. Which is why we are in the current dilemma
does that explain Chinas success, that didn't start with using fossil fuels, but with opening the markets - or what am I missing?
Capitalism is clearly the most exploiting idea
Hi comrade where do you live in India...m also Indian
What exactly do you find exploiting?
@@jabibgalt5551 the worker class
@@florentin4061 worker class who has talent and skills are one who succeed in capitalism
Oh yes and communist North Korea ain’t 😂
What's interesting about capitalism is that it makes poor people (sometimes the victim's of capitalism) believe that its working for them.
I have studied political philosophy for years now. And I have come to the conclusion that free-market laissez-faire capitalism, based on individual's rights, is the appropriate social system for human flourishing.
If this is true, it will be true regardless of how much money a particular individual owns.
@@jabibgalt5551 Could you elaborate how that would lead to human flourishing?
@@jabibgalt5551 Thank you and its the best we've come up with SO FAR..
Still trying to develop better ways right! :)
why instead of stealing from your employees to use as charity to the poor not just let the workers who produce get the resources?
Maybe you didn't listen to the whole talk? The whole point is that by integrating doing good into every aspect of the business, the business, investors, and employees are also better off. This isn't a zero-sum game.
pfff trickle down economics all over again, when is the wheel factory grand opening again?
Workers are content with their wages. Otherwise, they would most likely quit or demand raises. Capitalism isn't stealing. It's a private agreement between an employer and an employee that benefits both sides.
@@mattmcnamara871 Exactly. People need to be more vigilant.
That’s the QUESTION !!!
You can't solve a problem with the tools that create it. Capitalism is inherently suicidal and must be replaced with an ethical and compassionate system which values life. The profit motive will always function in an ultimately destructive way.
This one.^
Whatever “system” you live in, the self destruction follows when you impose your own interest at the expense of others. Profitability is not sustainable if you cheat or harm others. It’s not the system, it’s the people - working with or against those you agree or disagree with.
@@marksorensen4158 Profit IS cheating and harming others. It's literally the exploitation of workers to extract surplus labor for capital. THAT is the system. Individuals are only cogs in that machine. From top to bottom. The algorithm of profit maximization determines all action under capitalism.
A just system is one where all aspects of life are democratically decided upon.
You can solve a problem with the tools that create it. Capitalism is an ethical and compassionate system which values life. The profit motive will always function in a creative way.
Islam is awful
I honestly thought that Edgar was going to come out on stage at any moment and that he worked for the company now. Feels strange that he just checked up on him and then said see ya.
i know you had good intentions when you been teaching people in southeast asia how to pump up ground water.. but i live in bangkok... a city that sinks every day faster and might be under water soon, because people keep pumping up ground water from under the city :(
When the day comes i have to replace my car with a boat, i will name that boat “Davis”...
True Alain very true. And he doesn't even cover the third world poverty in the US itself like on the Native American Reservations.
Hi, I am from Myanmar. Thank you for your sharing. It is very touching. Who is My Edgar? or Am I an Edgar?
You can be both! We all need help sometimes, we need someone to recognize our struggle and have compassion and empathy for us. We also all need to be that person for someone else sometimes. To reach out and help another person who has less then us
The problem with capitalism is that it encourages unnecessary production, excessive waste and pollution. This isn't ideal, but it is an inevitability no matter how much we slow it down. The death of Earth that is. That and the preservation of life being the saliant motivation behind an argument against capitalism. Of which, I still haven't heard a fix for in the long term. So in the mean time, I don't see why we should all suffer in the short term, sacrifice the benefits of capitalism for the negatives of social control. One thing that we can take away from the Edgar story, is if he had to use private property and apply for licenses before selling sweets and pay taxes on them afterwards you can bet his entrepreneurial abilities would've only got him so far.
I followed you all the way to:
"I don't see why we should all suffer in the short term, sacrifice the benefits of capitalism for the negatives of social control."
So I wonder what the benefits of Capitalism, and all the negatives of sosial control is.
In Scandinavia we have it , the other way. We see Capitalism as not a free thing, like work.
And our Welfare as something very positiv and Socialistic. Free Health Care, Free Education,
1 year Paid Maternity Leave, 5-8 weeks Paid Vacation etc
But the first you wrote was as I would like to wright it myself.
@@sveingeraldhansen7275 Yeah I mean upon reading it back to myself, I was supposed to say "positives of social control", but I think you still understand the claim, you just find it difficult to understand my reasoning.
The reason you see capitalism as not free, and social welfare as free speaks volumes.
In reality it's the other way round. Capitalism is trade without restriction, to put it simply. Which is by definition, free!
Socialism then applies specific law, policies, regulation, taxation etc to businesses/traders in order for it to work in the interests of everyone else.
And I admit, social welfare appears to be free, but in order for you to receive a service for free, the person offering the service still needs to be paid. They don't work for nothing and that money needs to come from somewhere. And money is just a temporary token of trade, and just acts in replacement of actual man-hours. You can't just print more money to cover the demand from social welfare, that fucks it all up!
The way I like to think of it is, rather than thinking of a whole country here, just imagine your home is the country and your dad represents the military, farming industry and agriculture, your mum represents the nurses and cleaners, your siblings cover other areas of trade; like waste disposal, building, DIY, car manufacturer etc etc etc and that's your country. Other households (for the sake of this analogy) are other countries. Within your country, you, as an independent trader may be able to do your 'thing' really well. You may be able to bake bread and build houses, or fix bikes etc etc. But when it comes to finding grain, or healing injuries, or protecting yourself against attack, you don't seem to fair as well as other people in "your country" do (e.g. dad). Equally those members may not be able to bake bread like you. So instead, everyone joins a team, so that in your case, you can protect yourself as well as you bake bread if that makes any sense. And for dad (aka the military), he can now bake bread at a level of excellence comparable to his expertise in combat. This is more efficient way of living for everyone. It means you don't spend 200 years (that you don't have) building your own iPhone when you want one. You essentially build it in a week without learning any additional skills!
Now, lets do the same analogy again, but scale up to a site about the size of your old school. And add another 1000 people to the game. At this stage, it's great, we have more people, so more diverse products and services to offer. But, sometimes you have to travel a pretty long distances to find the service(s) you want. And so rather than trading one-on-one directly, product of value for product of value; we instead collectively agree to see value in an otherwise valueless, insignificant, cheap to make (but difficult to counterfeit) piece of paper as a way to make trade even more efficient.
So in this (1000 strong) collective, we have a mixture of economically successful people and economically unsuccessful people. The latter who live a lower status, less luxurious lifestyle as a result of not have much to offer of value to anyone. Pretty understandable. People trade their man-hours for man-hours they desire. People don't buy things they don't want. People don't work for nothing. You can consider this so far as being a capitalist free-market economy, people are driven by lust, greed, power, social status, professional prestige etc etc etc. Those people, who remember create the economy and create the diverse range of products and services on offer, are in a socialist/social-democratic economy the people who are enabling those who would otherwise suffer as a result of their inabilities to instead do better, and in extreme cases live another day to vote on a policy which asks for more taxation (e.g. man-hours) for social services. This is the same as me doing nothing, and deciding that because you're really successful you should pay for my health. As nice as it sounds, there are flaws which need addressing. And just to be clear, socialism, for anyone who doesn't know, is the idea that while we're all part of a group with a common goal; business owners, producers and manufacturer's etc, who have worked hard to ensure their children live another day, must give up a control of the means in which their business operates, so that it meets the needs of everyone else. The customers, employees, local residence etc. This comes in the way of workplace policy and legislation, licenses, taxation, pension schemes, minimum wage etc. The UK system also comes with "free" healthcare and unemployment welfare. All these things which sound great from one side of the argument, but aren't often looked at from the other side. If you're simply a bread maker, it might not play on your mind that much, giving up half your freedoms and a percentage of your wealth for the benefit of "free" health care. But if you're a highly independent, highly successful and socially inept character (who's been tormented by highly social, highly popular people a lot in life), you might think to yourself "why are my life choices always dictated by the kind of intellectually lazy, unproductive, untalented, shallow-minded social conformists people like me are technically keeping alive? When I could be finding, doing and making everything I need to survive in some cave somewhere in complete solitude." You start thinking, why do we have a society and why do I have to be a part of it. This is the libertarian conservative view which is gaining a lot more traction now as people are starting to learn more about politics. Most people don't really think for themselves when it comes to politics and just feel like they've got to pick one. To add, most people don't even question the morality of authoritarian regimes, almost as if it never occurred to them that they have a right like anyone else to say "that shit's just not right" .
Socialism is theft, via authoritarian government.
"It's possible for 5 individuals to find their own wealth independently without being aggressive towards each other. That's independence, that's capitalism, that's conservatism!
"It's not possible for 3 individuals to take the other 2 individuals wealth without aggression" That's theft by force, that's socialism, that's left-wing thinking today.
@@C.D.J.Burton
Everyone pays for the welfare, it is paid by tax 32,2 % tax, for tax and Health Care, Free University, 1 year Paid Maternity Leave,
and 5-8 weeks paid Vacation etc
And we don`t have many that don`t want to work. Norwegians likes to work.
And how can Socialism be a theft,
Socialism is not a theft, but Capitalism is.
How you can see The Capitalist getting much more money than the workers as fair.
Look at US , almost all workers have a very
hard life, while the Capitalist have endless money.
And I had my own Company for 21 Years,
so I know what I am talking about.
You could make your company to AS.
And then you were sure to not loose much money.
And why we have a Society, is to improve the lives for everybody.
That is what we try to do. Not to a few .
And Norway , Sweden, Denmark with Social Democracy and a whole lot of benefits the Rich in USA don`t let the people in US have.
So good luck with US Capitalism.
It is a joke All around the World.
For 4 dager siden
I'm an American, living with my relatives in France for six months. If there's anything I've learned from my stay here, it's that, from the perspective of Europe, the US truly seems like a backwards country.
BaronNolanvonStraya
For 4 dager siden
4:41 When he says that other nations look at the US with pity it’s true. I’m from Australia and here we the general populace don’t view America as a shining beacon of democracy and freedom anymore, but instead as a squalid backwards country, a relic of a bygone era. I remember when one of my friends went to America on holidays and when she came back she told me that everything there just ‘felt poor’.
Socialism
50 people buy a company together and democratically choose a leader.
And the 50 OWNERS start working
When they have worked and the income turns out, they share everything, equally.
Capitalism:
The same workplace and the same
50 people,
but now they are only employees, not capitalists, only workers,
the Capitalist can say and do whatever he wants , the workers must avoid problems
with the capitalist or get fired (US)
And now the Income , the workers have a fixed salary,
and the Capitalist takes the rest, enough to earn a good profit for the Capitalist.
Again in Socialism all the people owns.
But in a Capitalist system 1 owns,
and the rest is Workers, even if they should
earn
$
5000 000 a year.
USSR; Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , China, etc was dictatorships.
And not Socialism.
Socialism is a less rigid, more flexible ideology. Its adherents seek change and reform, but insist on making these changes through democratic processes within the existing social and political structure, not overthrowing that structure.
Social democracy, the most common form of modern socialism, focuses on achieving social reforms and redistribution of wealth through democratic processes, and can co-exist alongside a free-market capitalist economy.
Likewise, no country in history has achieved a state of pure socialism.
Even countries that are considered socialist states, like Norway, Sweden and Denmark, have successful capitalist sectors, and follow policies that are largely aligned with social democracy.
The graph of poverty rates is misleading. In 1820 the World population was about 1 billion so about 0.94 billion people were living in poverty. In 1990 the World population was about 6 billion so just over 3 billion people were living in poverty. Hence, the number of people living in poverty had increased by a factor of more than 3.
Yep and the word poverty is defined to fit the needs of Capitalism. What was so bad about candles? or not having the NFL? or drinking from a river? Most people alive today were born for no other reason than to service Capitalism. Of course it will do its best to keep these feeders feeding.
Stop, you gonna say that poverty decreased from 94% to 50%?
We don't need to throw out capitalism, we just need better capitalism. I still want to eat mcdonalds.
you want to. that dosnt explain why capitalism isnt harmful
The problem is that humans are living in such huge populations. We as a species were never meant to live like we are. The only way we could fix this would be if everyone significantly reduced their lifestyle to only acquiring things that they needed, rather than things that they want. But that will never happen, and so we will continue to spend decades upon decades trying to fix the problems that we create without realizing that we're creating the problem. It's like a hydra, you cut one head off and two more grow back. Idk if that makes sense but whatever
I don't personally believe the core issue is populations. Like you said it's lifestyles and consumerism (ofcourse exacerbated by large population) but this has been encouraged by capitalism. This has led to many by products like the climate and biodiversity crisis, pandemics, etc.
Capitalism doesn't make the world a better place. Individuals within it can, but capitalism is a system, not a person, and as a system in only encourages the worst kind of people.
It incentives innovation , that's why we have smart phones etc
@@seankelly378 At the cost of?
@@sadshitpoorpoop silicon, electricity, and time for research and testing
Problem is there are two definitions of capitalism and it confuses people. One is people trading freely with each other. The other is a corrupt government concentrating wealth. These are not the same thing. One does not lead to the other. These two functions actually oppose each other.
Excellent theme... There danger in "...crass materialism, which lays excessive and everincreasing emphasis on material well-being, forgetful of those things of the spirit on which alone a sure and stable foundation can be laid for human society." ~ Shoghi Effendi, Baha'i Faith
The poverty chart from 1820 to the "present" showed a radical change in global poverty rates, largely resulting from Capitalism. The people who are still living in poverty will never go away. Why? Because until the present, government gave people the means and motivation to get themselves out of poverty. Now, government has stripped people in poverty of motivation to pull themselves out. Turns out that some politicians found that careers in Socialist politics can be very lucrative. So people in poverty now find that they can live comfortable lives entirely from government welfare. Why work to become self supporting? What a shame .
Capitalism (Marx opined that Capitalism was the quickest way to prosperity) or redistribution of wealth, neither are the answer to solve poverty. Poverty is the gradient needed to climb high, a formula ingrained into evolution, which has a mind of its own and brings prosperity only in small steps.
But you are right, capitalism and free market economy brought prosperity to millions and brought even insurmountable problems with it, this is how the intelligent design of our existence works out.
What is needed is a system that keeps the spirit of Edgar alive, while providing opportunity to sustainable honest karma and avoid the 1% to amass disproportionate accumulation of wealth, only if taxed 90% like FDR or Eisenhower, to create opportunities.
A 'self-justifying' speech that annoyed me from the beginning.
It is very obvious that this rich man was purely interested in justifying his wealth, whilst pretending that he was 'a force for good'.
He provided a tiny amount of help to help poor people in other (far poorer....) countries, but never mentioned whether he was paying his poorest employees a living wage in the US.
The height of this talk for me was when the speaker told about many good things they managed to achieve while for them as a business this "costed them nothing".
So there ovbiously is a way for capitalists to do a lot of good, without hurting their bottom line. But they have so little desire to do so, that even the possibility of it happening is presented as a discovery worth of a talk.
And this is the greatest indicator that capitalism is broken and should be replaced with a better system.
Because making lives of people better just because you can and it doesn't cost you anything is not how capitalism operates. More often it operates by making lives of few people better, by making lives of many people worse, while extracting as much profit as possible.
Like this touching story about the boy opening a tiny business to support nis family... Why nobody asked the question which circumstances put this childs family into a position where parents can't support their children? I Highly doubt that they are not working their asses off.
This isn’t capitalism,it’s not capitalism without competition.Once the key ingredient is missing it is no longer capitalism.
Exactly, they are confusing capitalism with crony capitalism or corporatism. Capitalism raises everybody up, and gives an enormous boost to the economy. Products are cheaper and everything is better quality. Monopolies are by definition not possible under capitalism.
We are not confusing. markets tend to not stay free for long. If there's competition, there will be losers and winners. Losers go out of business, winners acquire (semi-)monopolies.
In our world politics dictates economic outcomes. What we refer to as "democracy" requires examination. Are the processing of governing participatory, representative or delegated, or some combination of all three? How are individuals chosen to serve in public office? Do the systems of law, regulation and taxation meet objective tests of justice? Or, do these systemic forces secure and protect monopolistic privileges that result in the redistribution of wealth from producers to non-producing "rentier" interests? Is there an appropriate balance under law between the protection of property and human rights? What, in fact, is property? What we produce with our labor (and whatever capital goods we own) is surely our property. What about nature? Nature is not produced by any person. Land and natural resources are provided to us free of charge. Do some have a greater claim on nature than others? If so, what is the principle involved? None of these issues has been resolved by human societies as the centuries have come and gone. The philosopher Mortimer J. Adler suggested that the extent to which just law, justly enforced, exists in a society is whether the overwhelming majority of citizens have access to the goods of decent human existence. if many people do not, one can logically conclude that there is serious injustice at play. Many thoughtful intellectuals have offered an analysis of how and why some (whether a majority or just a significant minority) have not enough when others have far more than needed. The person I have come to believe offers the greatest insights and most practical solutions was the 19th century political economy Henry George. Every thoughtful person would benefit from reading his 1879 book "Progress and Poverty." This book, which has sold millions of copies since it was first published and has been translated into almost every language, brought people as diverse as Leo Tolstoy, Albert Einstein, Sun Yat-Sen, and John Dewey to devote much of their energy to bringing Henry George's vision of the just society to reality.
7:26 "what do we want capitalism to look like over the next hundred years?"
eradicated from humanity
Umm... Maby the actual concept of poverty has changed during the last 200 years. And just maybe the value of money has changed too. It's also a possibility that people used to farm their own food back in the day and people didn't actually need a credit card to survive from everyday life. This guy is a total joke.
Well we have whole third world countries that are still in agriculture economy where concept of poverty haven't changed during 200 years
The only reason why capitalism beat poverty that poverty can be beat only by producing
Like famine can be beat only by food
Capitalism let people make businesses, produce products to make a profit
@@ХейХей-ю3ф capitalism isn't pro-producing nor pro-availability. capitalism is pro-capital and pro-profit (for the business owners), these things aren't interconnected to the ones I mentioned before. for example the agriculture business isn't maximizing their production or trying to beat world hunger, they maximize their profit by meeting their consumers demand with the highest possible profit. giving agriculture industry as an example since you mentioned food, the agriculture issue isn't under-producing but mostly over-producing, they try to meet their consumers demand and reduce food wastage while maximizing profit. despite the fact that the market actually needs more food, and our technology can easily meet their demands, capitalism refuses it.
another thing is that, agriculture industry is 95% automated and we're moving into 100% automated already. yet the prices of food remain the same as always. because the price isn't set based on how much work you've done but the market demand of your products. as long as people demand and eat food, it'll always be capital. essentially the agriculture farm owners have a money-farming machine that generates capital for them forever and as long as people eat.
capitalism isn't 'make business xd'. capitalism is the privatization of the means of production exclusively towards the owners. the means of production nowadays are 'human resources'. R&D, tech industry, medicine, schools, and almost all industries, the most important factor is human resources by far. big corporations require their workers to constantly innovate to create and improve the products while the workers can even earn 10% of the profit of what they're creating, the profit goes to the business owner even if the owner does absolutely nothing and just leeches of the profit.
We've become so dependent on the medical industry, technology, chain supermarkets... they can do what they want and we either comply or go without.
We need to rethink what we comply with why we do so.
Tom's Shoes! Hahahaha, that's some excellent research you've done schmuck. Love these 'entrepreneurs' talk about how business is the holy grail of doing everything right. The only solution is business! What BS. Business is good at making a profit, even, or losing money since profit is not guaranteed (much to the annoyance of business owners).
Capitalism is a million losers and one winner, that's it's definition no matter how they want to spin it.
Everyone is a winner in capitalism. Are you saying that there are only 7,000 people in the world that have are winners? I think the majority of the population are probably happy with their life, and thus believe they are winners
@Cheri Merchant capitalism is the best economic system that has ever been created. Not just for the people at the top, but it betters the lives of nearly everyone in it, in some way or another
@Cheri Merchant why do you not like capitalism?
@@malachymoreland7417 Hey buddy, take a look at the environment. Go to China, they're much more successful at capitalism. Go work at Amazon, are you a winner? Million dollars for a house? Jobs that are increasingly low-wage, whilst you got jobs that don't provide a better way to live, but profit? What about the children that are mentally disabled in mathematics? Our education? Our youth?
@@eigelgregossweisse9563 China isn't a capitalist country, though...
His story would have really moved me if I heard Mr. Ekman DID something to change Edgar’s life; whether build him a humble Adobe house, build him a letrine or buy him a low priced toilet for the Adobe house. You see, to me this narrative is incomplete.
He lost me when he said TOMS was an amazing company...any entrepreneur would say different.
yeah most people don't realize giving Africans shoes just hurts local cobblers
@@jamest3597 why
The rich person is the one who will never die!
Good chat. capitalism is truly ruining the world. But everyone's too busy with their iPhones and comfortable lives that they don't pay any attention.
LolToalNoobs and what do you propose
Unlucky_Spoon a less comfortable life, one in which company's can't triumph over the health of the planet, or its inhabitants. Socialism comes to mind.
LolToalNoobs socialism is where people who work for their money get a portion of that taken away to some1 who doesn't work
Unlucky_Spoon right, in order to prevent a ruling class everyone should become more equal. Everyone works toward a common goal and therefore community becomes richer. The government can put forth regulations for companies to prevent excessive waste products. But really we got to stop relying on oil (gas, fuel, plastics) and move toward cleaner fuels. This is a world issue which cannot be easily solved. I think we'll get there eventually.
LolToalNoobs if someone hard earned money is taken away even if it's a portion it will discourage the people that are working to not work anymore
oh i just cant listen to these moral mannequins
Hard to cope with data when it clashes so hard with your beliefs, huh?
They always say the same thing but never give any answers. I hear yea
@@chelseab5467 I believe the answers are to continue to educate yourself, spread awareness, and mobilise as a population, and collectively rise up. I get that the 'rise up' part is vague, but that's because the answer isn't one that's simple, quick and definitive. We need to say goodbye to our pride and resist the systems, put pressure on them. There are many ways to do this that I am still learning, but there are also many activists and resources that can help. All we need is to get rid of our pride, and be inspired and determined. There is no quick and easy answer, radical collective action is what it'll take.
@@zoeskinner2871 The " rise up " is to overthrow the oppressors. Where did I leave that pitchfork? ;-)
I prefer to be a little skeptical about this theory: that capitalism can be good if used and understood in a good way. I´m definitely not sure about it. I think that even if each business in the world work, in some way, to the community it is part of, the world will continue being a place full of poor and starving people. The problem is in the structure. Doing what this guy is saying will just mask the troubles caused by capitalism. We have to change the structure. We have to think of another way humans could live without explore other´s work.
His interpretation of the statistics is counter intuitive to me. I don't think it's possible to say that the billion people who are not in poverty are the same people who were in poverty. The people who were impoverished back then could have died and then been replaced by people born into better off places/families. No?
What I propose is to create a new form of government that takes the good things about capitalism and the good things about communism and mix them together.
@James Gravil And it doesn't solve capitalisms problems.
The good parts of capitalism and communism just results in pure capitalism. There are no good parts of communism
@@malachymoreland7417 u clearly don't even know what communism is, you just talk out of spite
@@karldurden1303 the seizing of the means of production and the redistribution of wealth
@@malachymoreland7417 like I said u don't understand communism
Capitalism is a religion whose people worship money (profit)
heri styono Socialism is a religion whose people worship taking other people’s money
@@aspiringretard and worship the state
Isnt that what capitalism does?, take other peoples labour and money just because you bought a few shares, or underpay just because the employees are not able to ask their labours worth.
@@davidemmyg no, under capitalism, you are not "taking other people's labour or money", if you hire me to sell some of your products, the profit shouldn't go to me. You take the financial risk of starting a business, and I opted for a more financially secure job for less pay. People only work for what they think their labour is worth. Guess what, if you work for $5/hr, it's because you think that's all your labour is worth. You choose to work for a company, you choose to not set up a business, you choose to not invest. Capitalism is about choice. Marxism is about coercion
Nobody escapes capitalism to go to communism. Many risk life to escape communism.
Both are terrible
most people with 30 years mortgage have no choice or do they ?
Capitalism the game where the goal is to make enough Capital for one's self so you can stop playing the game.
The problem with a particular economic system is what goals it incentivizes. Whatever that goal is, it will displace goals that would interfere with achieving it.
Technology is pulling people out of poverty, but capitalism for sure takes the credit for it.
Carlos Spicyweiner - Great point. Technological development and modern capitalism are inextricably linked. Plenty written on the subject. You really can't do one well without the other.
NASA says that the reason we haven't yet gone to Mars is because of only one reason, COST.
Company discovered technologies (ie pharmaceuticals) being hidden from the public, or cures that could save lives now are drawn out over immense times to increase profit, as, it would be at too great a COST.
The reason for not cleaning up any of the Earths pollution, nor promoting many environmental break-throughs, is because of COST.
Over 87% of scientists (you know, the ones that actually contribute to science and technological advancements) say that they are under funded more and more every year due to COST.
The entire health insurance scenario, in splinters because of COST.
Less students going to school every year, meaning less educated individuals to create new technologies now because of COST.
Want me to go on ... ?
"You really can't do one well without the other."
Technology advances are possible due to higher education which is funded by tax money. Capitalism has nothing to do with it.
Example: USSR had great technology at its time.
Where does tax money come from? The citizens and their businesses correct? If those citizens and businesses do not have an environment in which to thrive, they create less wealth, which limits their ability to pay for natural, human, and technological resources. Then their business cannot keep up with global competition that may have better environment, and therefore better access to resources (human, natural, technological). The USSR had great technology, because they were determined to spend their time, energy, and country's resources on developing that technology. The US spent the same energy, time and resources, but not at the detriment of their countries well being. The USSR collapsed, in part, because it (government) didn't know how to best use limited resources, yet it was still determined to have the government manage those resources. Had the USSR seen the US's thriving suburban life, they would have known sooner that their communist economy was a failure.
Most of these are subsidized by government. Subsidizations increase demand, thus increasing the price of a commodity, service, etc. To use a free enterprise philosophy as a proxy for a regulated one is utterly fallacious.
Inequality is the inevitable consequence of unregulated capitalism. Guaranteed, every time. This is not the fault of capitalism, the monster is is what it is. It's the fault of society and the the fact that they elect capitalists to represent what should be the balancing factor of the equation to ....capitalism...
Emotional hitman
That's great dad he did this but the system fundamentally puts profit and the growth of it overall, things like this just aren't encouraged and won't happen.
When people owns more goods/services than they can use and they want even more, what they are really seeking is power. Power to control others. They become small states themselves. I think he is a good guy but I don't believe in the system he seems to believe.
there is no reason for poverty. if people are poor, its their own faults. there is likely enough jobs for peole but not enough jobs in one particular business that gives superior income that everyone wants to be part of one and the same jobs. its also that poor people are just as greedy as rich people. they don't want to move away from their city into places where they can get job and house. if there was delicious cake in front of people and and stinky one next to it, everyone would want the delicious one and not the stinky one. people wan't to live an work and have house in rich places rather than poor places even if they themselves are poor. peole don't like to move around. they wan't to say where they are. this is the real problem. its also a problem for businesses as they too don't like to make money out poor places and like more central locations of their business. if you are resoruceful and can be happy by living in a poor place and create value and resources out of that, you can create jobs or just get a job that will give you money for a home and food on the table. if people realized that all rich cities have been on ground that once in the past was barren land devoid of life, they would understand that there is no excuse for their poverty other than their own fault.
Dream on.
you have absolutely no clue what you`re talking about.
Capitalism = Communism. Individuals own the people. The state owns the people. What's the difference?
Capitalism is both hurting and helping us. We need capitalism, but we also need to rework parts of it.
Get rid of money.
Why? Money is just a tool, a means of exchange. Any and all civilizations have used some form of money. Primitive tribes used salt, sea shells, silver and gold, and of course, paper money.
That is like wanting to solve world hunger by getting rid of food. "If there was no food, no one would need food, thus hunger would disappear".
@@jabibgalt5551 Wrong the money we use is DEBT, and that is the problem. Debt can be leveraged true money cannot.
@@johndough23 You are right, the FIAT money we use right now is based on nothing but promise of payment (debt); but that does not mean that all money must be of that nature. As I mentioned, people can (and have) use other objects as money, such as salt, seashells, gold and bitcoin, which are not necessarily based solely on promise of payment. .
So rich boy becomes richer and poor boy stays poor.
So should we steal money from that rich dad and give that money to that poor boy . Is this ethical? Why ?
@@AbhishekRoy-eh5wz It is hard to respond to this without knowing you personally, but still I will try.
As far as the question of ethics is concerned I think what happens currently (the tax system) is precisely this. So I would like to know how you feel about that.
And in terms of economics it was John Maynard Keynes who said that and automated surplus recycling mechanism is what is required to prevent economic crisis any further, because if surplus is left to the capitalists their natural way of employing it would not be with the interest of the society as a whole.
@@aniruddhasarkar2409 r u pointing out that capitalist pay less tax ?? Ok let me just assume that you r a student and your parents work in big company . Let's calculate then capitalist first have to pay 1.20-25% of their personal income as tax
2.Then their major chunk goes in salary payment of workers .
3. After that they have many taxes -taxes of each state ,taxes of central government , land tax , factory hoarding tax ,taxes on international profit , dockyard operation tax ,import duties and many more which normal tax system don't recognise and people say middle class and Poors only pay taxes . In comparison to those taxes how many taxes your parents pay ? (Income tax , charity tax ,epf tax more than that I don't think they pay taxes )
4 . If capitalist hold money then they employ thousands of people give them job , salary , money etc . I don't think you will ignore that .
5 . If a person is poor it's his own fault not that capitalist bcz open market give everyone equal chance to take big risk in life and earn more . Ambani family Adani family kheda groud , Aditya birla group all were from humble background only . Free market don't discriminate anyone .
6 . Capitalism give power and prosperity socialism give corruption . Best example of capitalism is usa uk japan south Korea isreal . Capitalism removes poverty .
Nobody is saying poor boy to stay poor ,if he will think big , dream big , take risk in life , work hard he will get whatever position he want .if money earned by poor people has value then surely money of rich people also has value . Both earn money by hard work diffence is appetite of taking risk .
@@AbhishekRoy-eh5wz Firstly, you misunderstood me. I didn't say that capitalists don't pay taxes. Rather, as you said, robbing from the rich and redistributing their money is unethical, I asked you what you think about our tax system, because the tax system does precisely that, takes a part of capitalist's surplus and use it for social welfare and development.
By the way, asking a poor person to take risk is not very different from asking any human being to fly. It is meaningless. Just like the human being lacks the apparatus required for flying (wings) the poor person lacks the apparatus required for taking risk (capital).
There are many other things wrong with what you said, but first I would like to look at your response about taxes, which you ostensibly speak so dearly of.
@@aniruddhasarkar2409 I don't think its problem of tax system but more of government policies and its attitude of implementation of those . All those capitalist were from humble background only .so it's all dependent that on how much anyone want to work hard . And I didn't said obstensibly but truth only as many of my family members r entrepreneurs so I know what tax government take from international players , big giants , small budding businesses .
Don't hate the players, hate the game.
I hear Venezuela is killing it right now.
US sanctions are killing Venezuala.
Stories like this inspire me!! Great job! Best vibes from Peru!
" What had been an alleged ideal is now a ragged skeleton rattling like a scarecrow in the wind over the whole world , the grinning skull under the bloody rags. That skeleton is socialism. "
-Ayn Rand-
Lol
We are proud of Capitalism and the change has done in the world for humanity without it numbers of poor people today could increase out of control..
Capitalism need to be controlled from monopoly & debt only...
Dear come and visit dubai and see what Capitalism has done by changing died desert land(no rain no food) into one of most tourist country in the world and in rich its people....Dear think✌
Not only Dubai, Singapore also.
Meanwhile my country India, with immense resources opted for nationalisation of resources. Until 1980's, India was pretty much socialism. After a more capitalistic approach, India is one of the fastest growing economies
" Capitalism leaves men free for self-defense , but gives no one the political means to initiate force or war . "
-Ayn Rand-
Even funnier
It destroyed the capitol, that's for sure xD
You aint wrong
Thank you. Your life experiences that you share with us in this video are very moving. Also, you have pleasant calm voice and appearance. I'm sure the audience will agree. I will be looking forward to the TED TALK You give in the future. 😊
Well, the story with Edgar was touching. But you can't depend on some "good" companies or people to change the inequality rates. By the time the system it's self promotes the limitless production of wealth, there will always be greedy people that keep destroying communities and the planet. It's simply inevitable. Goodhearted millionaires aren't the ones that will save us.
"Capitalism has lifted billions out of poverty" - on which planet?
Na'xia Xi'Larn
Earth
Poverty seems to be something to deal with money. People who don't have enough money is on the list. But in the 1800(s), money it's not that important , people made food their own, so money that time it's something you don't have enough to buy food, but you still have enough food to survive, food that time is the only important. But capitalism made money is more important. So it seems like poor people are richer and richer but they actually have more money and less food.
Since Capitalism was first thought of. Any country that has embraced Capitalist policies has a better general standard of living than any Medieval King.
Capitalism has moved the majority of the world who endorses it from farming to industry. Instead of people relying on food production they can move to more important things
Tomato Pa Crony capitalism brought greater inequality. Capitalism does the opposite- it literally raises the people from the bottom and generates mass ammounts of wealth that come down to the poor through jobs created by the rich. What do you think capitalism means?
eleven points to the solution!
- upper financial limit for all! Everything above this limit is taxed at 100%. eg. at 300 million fr. to draw a limit for individuals. that would have far-reaching benefits.
- insane basic income!
that does not mean completely unconscious. a model in which everyone from 18 years onwards gets paid regardless of their salary. the reason for this is that nationality must be switzerland, one must pursue an activity and or do something for the common good. at least once a week. eg. collecting waste in the street, caring for someone, ect.
- a money transfer tax!
In the world of finance, billions of euros are pushed back and forth in fractions of a second via the internet every day. because of speculation on the stock exchange and so on. so the speculation is contained and incidentally, there are tax receipts in a gigantic amount of the general good. So the basic income can be easily financed.
- absolute financial transferability for every politician! this ensures that the politician works for the benefit of the population. and not in the interest of a few less rich.
- a sugar tax!
By now, most foods contain sugar or other sweeteners that are harmful to your health and addictive. -a very strict ban on lobbyism! There are many interest groups in the government (banks, industries, large corporations) that steer politics in their favor.
-minimum wage!
a minimum hourly wage that is generally binding. you have to be able to live from your work.
-A percentage of profit for each employee of a company at the end of the year!
Every employee of a company has worked to make a company profitable. Without the work of a co-leader, there can be no profit in a company. By the way, the employees are also motivated.
- Concrete regulations for affordable living space!
There is less and less affordable living space. a flat is vital. and you can only choose limited where you want to live because of the work. every 5 years must be at least 10'000fr. be invested in a flat directly. otherwise the mietzins automatically drops by 50%. down to the pure maintenance costs of the apartment. which must be meticulously documented. to the maintenance costs without investment may not exceed 300fr. additional income per month.
- a bank is liable as a whole for the assets entrusted
a bank may only trade real money! Bank members can be expropriated in case of losses in order to pay back the people they saved. In this way, the general public is not liable for taxpayers' money losses. nor can the bank cadre still stuff his pockets with taxpayers' money.
media law!
division of the 4th violence. All media must inevitably be divided into at least 8 parties. There must be no connection between the respective parties. otherwise, this leads to the expropriation of the respective parties, the withdrawal of the media license and to a complete redistribution of the companies concerned.
peter penner you’re insane
So why didn't he hire Edgar, bring him to the US? Since he meant so much to him, why not?
James, great question. I've debated for the last 18 months how to best help Edgar. Hiring him and bringing him to the US was obviously one of my first thoughts, but the more I explored this, it wasn't the right solution. He has younger siblings he is raising there, and he is Peruvian. The answer isn't to bring everyone who is suffering to the US. Instead, I'm helping him pay for a 3-year program where he is learning to be a tour guide. This is something he enjoys, has natural talents/abilities for, and will sustainably allow him to support his own family. I'm already working with him on what it might look like to start his own business in the tourism sector.
Davis Smith that sounds good. Teach a man to fish. I hope he sticks with it. Maybe he can be a consultant for South American markets. Who knows. Glad you could help him.
I think if we ‘rescue’ all people living in poverty by removing them from their communities, it becomes cultural genocide. We need to help them come up with their own solutions.
Ehhhhh, talking about eye care lexotica has a monopoly on the entire eye industry, and toms helps destroy the African cobblers. so....It's kinda like the american constitution, we talk a big game but sometimes don't live up to that. It's a good place to put the bar though, aim for the top, even if you miss you'll land somewhere close.
A poor person today has more available to them than the top 1% had 200 years ago.
never trust him if he is making millions and millions because that simply means which use this so called helping people as a marketing tool , and have nothing to do with people its a cunning practice
The only way to be rich under capitalism is to benefit lots and lots of people's lives by giving the consumer a product they want, and value more than their money. (Voluntary exchange of goods via private person)
People by far are the absurdist species alive: We literally pay to live on this planet.
Looks like somebody missed economics class. Think about how absurd it is that we are the only species alive who know that 99.9% of species to have ever existed on this earth are now extinct. Let that sink in.
@@rpalmatres5898 How does this relate to economics, though? Looks like someone missed English classes...
@@cohlinegarnet8313 Irony is so flipping crazy because I paid someone to take my online English 1302. I didn't have to log in one time but i got the credit. I also did not find it "absurd" because we were both better off as a result of our contract. For $500 I was able continue and finish college.
Translation: You are not paying to live on this planet, you are paying for someone to provide you with a good or service. You trade your "Capital" (knowledge, skills, labor, experience, talent etc.) for money 💰. Then you are able to spend your 💰 on someone else's good/service that you value more than that money you worked for. If that good or service wasn't worth it, then I suspect you would not trade your money.
Nice thought, businisess with social responsinility, i beöieve in that, but capitlalism essence is the profit!! I think a combined sociaity between capitalism and socialism is the way. More laws to big cororations!! Its unaceptable that corporations like Amazon doesent pay any taxes!!!
aww.... so cute. Capitalist problems solved by "donations". Well, you can consider tax a "forced" donation.
Exactly. That's why we say, "Taxation is theft".
Thanks for being upfront about the force involved. Most socialists wait until the have the Gulag set up before they talk about force.
You would have been an excellent apologist for the British Empire circa 1770.
Evandro Lima if we agree on what we all want to put money into and we all put in a percentage. Then we ALL benefit. Its not rocket science. Property values in certain neighborhoods are high. They are able to pay for better schools and other resources. *in theory* though many people use property taxes as a means of keeping certain people out. However, if you are a business and you get tax right offs in a neighborhood because you employ 100 people. It should in theory help.
More people are employed, yet the taxes are high, they are employed. The minimum wage is still stagnant, but people are employed.
15 dollars an hour full time for 100 people should equal or be greater than the amount of tax right offs...because if not schools and everything else covered by property taxes, suffer.
You are confusing capitalism with crony capitalism or corporatism. Capitalism raises everybody up, and gives an enormous boost to the economy. Products are cheaper and everything is better quality. Monopolies are by definition not possible under capitalism.
Lawsuits.
Damn couldn't help build my man Edgar a house or something damn
Eeeerrrr muuuh Steven Pinkeeeer graphs
Destroyed.
I smell B.S. if you want to help the poor teach them to be self sustain. Grow their own food. Build own home. Google Jon Jandai.
The comments 🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️
Capitalism makes the world worth living on.
I was depressed once... until I realized that thanks to capitalism, I can make my life better.
I wouldn't say that to the Indian working class.
Interesting people makes the world worth living on.
Derricks you don’t have to. Start a business. Be great. Make a commodity. The point of capitalism is that people compete to make groundbreaking technological advances that the leads to the furthering of human living standards. Competition breeds greatness, and in the fire of aforementioned competition we will advance faster than any other system.
Well done brother. Well done. Keep up the good fight!
While exploitation does occur, the left does want to tax average Americans more. That has been proven, time and time again. Whether its small-scale in California, New York, Chicago, or wide-scale in the United States. Taxing the top 1% 50%+ of their income does not solve issues, nor will it solve poverty issues at a lower-income scale as that money will not trickle to them, but to our government. The reason people aren't voting for Democrats is because you guys aren't providing any real results. If it was up to me, if you make under $50K/year, your tax should be all of 5% or less. It can scale upward, but just saying "OH, this man is successful, he worked hard and makes millions a year, we should tax him 50%" isn't a solution. Its just bias. I don't want to be penalized for being above average and successful, but I also don't want to hinder those below me. Think about that.
who sis my Edgar? Myself! :)
west is becoming more and more disturbing these days
indeed
Love you man.. Love you!!
is not capitalism or socialism... the issue is the human heart... The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? Jeremiah 17:9 Jesus can give us new heart... heart towards God and a heart toward each other.
Mises and I would disagree. Ok let the haters comment.
Is this white saviour complex?
Yep
It just feels like they're getting rid of the good old stuff!
I still don't get what capitalizm is!!
Asoh capital is the unpaid wages of the working class, given instead to the capitalist owner of the business
Dont listen to them. They are all ignorants. Capitalism is actually very simple: homesteading , producing and exchanging. Person A produces something , Person B produces other thing ,
Person A prefers what B has produced in turn of what itself produced. So they exchange and everyone is happy!
Modern capitalism is based on the following things (to my knowledge):
A lawful state that defines property rights and how economic behaviour is organised.
Legal security, which gives the safety required to move capital freely
Property rights, whcih include wealth that generates more wealth.
Large parts of the economic production are owned by private organisations.
This is basically it, depending on how the state and the people behave you can have different results, from a corrupted oligarchy to a modern welfare state like Norway.
It has proven to be often very effective in lifting developing countries out of poverty, e.g. South Korea and Japan are good examples for that.
no u
470th commented I’m capitalist I’m anti communist.
Wait a few more years and you won't see any EDGARS. Thanks to AI and ML.
*** You say there was 94% poverty in 1820, in relation to what? What do you define as poverty? Today I see substantial poverty(scarcity) of time as competition heats up around the world. I define poverty as being unable to shelter, cloth, and feed yourself with your daily wages or labor or having to labor 12 hours plus per day to afford the basics of life. Today, I see countries like India and China where the average factory worker has to slave away for 12 plus hours per day to afford the basics, but somehow this would be seen as progress, and that they are lifted out of poverty because they have a steady wage and the basics of life. Where my wife is from(Peru) they use to raise their own beef, and poultry on a ranch and grow all their own fresh food, but today most of her brothers and sisters seeking a life in the city have now ended up needing to work more than 12 hours per day 7 days a week to afford the high cost of city living when before all they had to do was bust their ass on the farm for 10 hours a day 7 days a week for 8 months of the year, and have 4 months to take it easy with only 4 hours of work a day(post harvest season). I think they are poorer for making this choice as they now have to work longer hours just to make someone else richer, and the quality of their food has gone down, their privacy, pollution, and insecurity from crime, and threat of being fired. Do you really call this typical 3rd world country situation for the average worker being lifted out of poverty? That is bullshit***
B Charron yes, because before they HAD to farm. Now they can choose other professions.
Christ. How self righteous and utterly unaware. Has he heard of oil and mining companies?
I'm sure he did. So?
your kidding yourself and others ,,capitolism requires constant growth impossible in a finite world ,,
This is the best talk I have seen on Ted x so far... I am speechless.
This makes me so happy! I totally agree on the matter of whether capitalism is good or bad.
capitalism is good if being used the right way.
we need more people like Davis Smith in this world!
Thanks Teun! That means a lot to me!
Teun Donk All humans are born with different capacities. If everybody is free, they are not equal. If everybody is equal, they are not free. What is more important? Freedom or equality?
Teun Donk 100 percent.
It seemed he was basing his statistics on Income, not wealth. That's the only thing I'll point out.
I hate this type of capitalism the most!!!!! He sells his cheap products to get a huge profit while at the same time making his company brand look good by giving free (cheap) stuff to the people in those poor area. It might look good in the front but in the back it is ruining those specific type of businesses in that country. So he is pretty much destroying his competition while making his brand look good. He is not helping them, but instead he is keeping them a poor country for a long time. If you want to really help them you invest in their economy so their country can be richer. As country gets richer so does poverty.