Glad mercantilism got a shoutout! In these uncertain times when capitalism is assumed to be the only model that can work, however horrible and unequal it might be, we need more awareness of mercantilism!
Isnt mercantilism proto capitalism? I doubt there is anything better than capitalism. Not state capitalism,socialism and communism cannot be good alternatives
Socialism is when the means of production are owned by the community. Was this ever truly the case in some country with modern economics and did not work?
Not so long ago, just after having received my degree on Biology and entering the work force, I started to study economics and finances on my own. My goals were (and still are): 1. Learn to optimize the way I allocate the capital at my disposal. 2. Have enough knowledge to be able to understand contracts before I sign them and (hopefully) stay away from bad deals and/or frauds. One of the first things that "felt wrong" was the amount of economists that take their field "too seriously" (as if it was a natural science instead of a social one), and preaching their beliefs and dogmas as if they were absolute scientific truths.
Thats completely true. I did a bachelors in engineering and changed my field with a masters in economics and I was struck by the way they even call it a science when almost nothing can be experimented in real life. However, as you say, they go around claiming that their ideas would work best as if it would be 100% true. They also use math in a conceptual way instead of us in engineering fields. Besides this, learning economics is super interesting and it allows me to put the puzzle pieces in place in my head and the fact that I know how the system works will hopefully make me able to turn this knowledge into an andvantage.
Couldn’t agree more. But what I found quite disturbing was the power economics and finance have on all other fields of study, especially science. They decide who gets what resources. A scientist could invent or innovate away, the middlemen that market and finance his invention ends up with 90% of the proceeds. I just thought that was unfair. Maybe scientists should all take compulsory lessons in finance and economics.
i believe that capitalism originally meant "what is most demanded by the market." but as soon as Edward Bernays blew open the box of advertising and propaganda, capitalism changed to simply "creation of demand."
@@leoniduvarov6565 if you create a problem that did not exist before then yes, you can. If you convince a big enough group about something, the people not following the trend will seem weird and end up conforming as well.
@@leoniduvarov6565except you can exploit someone’s herd mentality biologically hard wired like there is a culture of buying stuff and because of that you are gonna buy it if someone you love/are friends with you are wired to want to have that so you are on the same level as them and also you kind of have to like within the feasibility of everyone else in short yes yes you do need to buy things
08:06 - The idea of mercantilism was that an economy should try and export as much as possible while importing as little as possible because that way you could accumulate as much gold as possible.
I think that the core problem is that economics is only one half of the issue. The other is politics or rather the political shape of society what it considers important and so on. That interacts with economics and shapes what economic questions are important.
close.. economics is about the gathering / conversion / production and consumption of resources by a work sharing / specialized community that is being governed by rules that provide personal freedom and private property as principles every participant can count on. But this rule enforcing mechanism can also enforce rules that benefit a few at the cost of the rest.. now guess what some of us do?
The main problem is human nature. In the end every system is against human nature. If you really want a fair game then there should be neither a political, economical or justice system. Anarchy is the most dangerous but also the most natural way of life.
There are no more "classical" economists. The so-called economists of today are really 'political economists', concerned only about redistributing income/wealth from the more productive to the less productive.
Your video reminds me about how in the late 19th century they thought physics was solved. Every major phenomenon that could be seen could be explained by classical physics. There were just these tiny little discrepancies here and there like the fact that Mercury's orbit was a little off (later explained by Einstein's theory or relativity) or the fact that radiation was behaving a little oddly (later explained by quantum mechanics). Physicists despaired that there were no go problems left to solve.
reminds me of this: "There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened." - Douglas Adams
@@jasonhaven7170 Douglas Adams was a comedic writer, he knew exactly what he was saying. The disconnect is that you've interpreted this quote as a serious scientific postulate.
@@frozenchicken418 a better one would be the pursuit of knowledge as climbing a wall to shoot an arrow into another and climb that wall, forever repeating
@@jasonjungreis203 Not in this case though. He could have showed different takes on what has been tried and some theories instead of a brief history of mercantilism and capitalism
@@sedatmehmed4371 The question was, if there's a better economic system (as in, allowing more growth and wealth). Which there isn't. Communism and socialism has been tried and it achieves worse results. So there is no better system currently than Capitalism.
@@BeSk9991 Communism was never tried and things become much better in Scandinavia where they included socialist elements. So yes, there is a lot to be discussed
"We cant predict the future and dont really know much about what we're doing, this is the best we've got." Feels kinda like the world is built on hopes and dreams.
The only issue with calling economics a science, is the meaning of science which is a process that makes predictions off of repeatable results. Economics is primarily case studies so it doesn’t get any chances to concretely test it’s theories.
Perhaps economics is as much a science as astronomy, which also can't make predictions of repeatable experimentation? Instead both rely on making predictions, then making observations to determine if those predictions are supported or not.
I think it's interesting to look at the languages of each. The hard sciences use mathematics which has rules and relationships while economics uses a lot of statistics with averages and outliers.
@@mattackerson6728 As a basis Astronomy uses physics, chemistry... etc to breakdown pretty much everything in outspace. So its kind of a subset of these other fields of study and can be put into repeatable experiments for example a planet orbiting a star will not stop orbiting unless a force is acted upon said planet causing an outward or inward spiral. If anything Economics is more akin to a social science like psychology where you try to predict human behaviours as an agregate, but becomes a pseudoscience when you try looking at the individual level like cognitive psychology.
Soft sciences still use the scientific method, it's just harder to create experiments and verify things through experimentation. Not calling economics a science would be like not calling advanced particle physics a science because both are difficult to test. There are also cases where case studies convieniently happen to be control and variable experiments by chance.
What weirds me out to this day in economic science (as a former STEM major) is just that the field has quite a lot of formulas where you plug in values to calculate something or other. Then you go ask your profs where those values come from and he honestly tells you that someone just comes up with them and they approximately match what they expect to come out of the formula. And those values and formulas change every couple years...
@@GiRR007 of course, science is all about modeling the world with hypothesis and checking them. The fact that modes change is a sign of good health in a scientific field. If things progress into entrenched dogma, progress stagnates and science starves
All disciplines use tools to make measurements, and those measurements are then put into models. No measuring tools are perfect, and nor, in principle, can they ever be (particularly in a quantum universe). We need to realise that there are hidden ideologies in our measuring tools and also our theories. As finite beings, it couldn't be any other way. That's fine, as long as we are aware of it. The problem with most of the social sciences is that a lot of the measuring is done by very fallible, very ideologically driven humans using things like surveys, where you are basically inventing data because doing properly randomised control tests is economically or morally impossible. Even then it wouldn't be so bad but most of the participants actively try and hide this fact, including when you ask questions as a fellow academic at academic conferences. Everyone looks at you like you are a murderer when you bring up such issues. It is truly depressing.
The problem isn’t with using mathematical models as a tool; it’s the set of assumptions built into the models and how those assumptions often do not reflect economic reality that is the core issue. Assumptions around markets always reaching equilibrium or economic agents acting rationally to maximize utility are faulty and misguided- and lead to models that do a poor job of prediction and guiding sound economic policy. Trends in the discipline such as behavioral economics are beginning to challenge these assumptions and replace them with more sound premises - but we have a long way to go before these trends are formalized as rigorous, quantifiable models.
The thing is, they don't actually care if it's "wrong" because they serve ruling class interests. The economists have always been right when it comes to the rich getting richer, they just pretend they care about the welfare of all and when their theories fall flat they just shrug their shoulders and say "oh well". Mainstream economics is there to enrich the wealthy while convincing the poor they are being considered 🤣
You guys simply don't get it. EE's *Brilliant* use of "W" is an *Audible* lesson which he is *Skillshare (ing)* this reminder of the speculative frenzy in 17th-century Holland; Tulipmania - a kind of mass delusion, a frenzy for tulips which over time, and took the economy of Europe down like a *Nord VPN* node. One must be living in a vacant *SquareSpace* not to see how UA-cam creators all think they can get rich - thus taking the Worlds economy down with them, to a point we're re all just left with one *Dollar Shave Club* in our pockets.
What I found missing here was a recognition of the role of politics in deciding which economic theory is *applied*. Living in a country which has declined over decades of neoliberal destruction of the state in favour of rigged markets, its clear that one of economics' greatest challenges is that the motivations of those that implement its theories, and bankroll its theorists, need to be taken into account. Economics' unfortunate insistence that it is a "science" plays into this problem, by helping obscure the political dimensions to its arguments.
Well sometimes it's better to admit a group don't know rather than clasp onto straws and argue that some obscure form of socialism is this answer, as no one can honestly know for sure, just as if you'd ask a king or his court what the next system in the 1500 his only honest answer is 'i dont know'. Economist are not tarot readers and anyone who says they know the future of a particular field is probably not well enough read on the subject to know the basics or worse potentially a shill of some kind. If people are wondering a certain question but no one has the answer to it do you think it's better to admit a blind spot in a field of study or to Lie and offer up hypotheticals instead? May I ask what is your knowledge level on economics? And bonus points if it isn't copied from online amateurs with certain political points to make. I used to stupidly believe that abolition of the housing market would fix homelessness because of online communicators, however that communicator didn't know basic economics (they are however smart in areas that they specialise in) but for several reason all this isn't true at all, the most basic being- you need a exchange of housing as different stages of life need different housing, you can't bring up a family in a flat designed for some 18 yr old uni student.
The thing is, that from my understanding of my field, economics is not just about studying the economy but almost every other social interaction aswell. Economics is all about utility of the society. Therefore we just use economic Situations, since it is a easy way to put things into numbers and values, that can be calculated
Well, not really. Many disciplines can be broad enough to apply to all society. But once that happens, it loses all value. Economics is simply the study of the allocation of scare resources. It studies what to produce, how to produce it, and for whom.
@@ollielon5926 this is the common definition. But models like hendersons spatial eqilibrium are about all utility of are presentative inhabitant. So the allocation of the ‚scarce people‘ can only be understood, if all sources of utility are looked at. Also macroeconomists will not agree either, since the effects in the aggregate are much different an often have to be looked at through an institutional lense
A real economy calculates nature, resources and human social sciences together. As we can see better in the presentation by Peter Joseph called "Economic Calculation in a Natural Law Resource Based Economy." See for yourself. Doesn't it make more sense than the monetary-market system of capitalists looking to profit off of everything?
I think the easiest way to account for your critique is to say that, rather than a study of value, things of value and their allocation, economics can also be understood as a study of incentives. I.e. how do people make decisions, what influences their decisions and how to make systems which result in better decisions being made? What incentivizes corruption or crime for instance, or how do we get people to cooperate and make compromises? What is a good justice system or a good electoral system? All of these are very much problems that, while less mainstream in economics, can absolutely be tackled with economic tools.
I have often said, as an un-degreed historian, that "soft technology" advances are often overlooked. Along with your thesis here about Economics, I would also include such woefully underappreciated soft technology such as filling systems (filing cabinets, manila folders, serial numbers) and library organization (Dewey Decimal, etc.).
I feel that this video though ignores and communism in general which basically ignores the other tried alternative of the last century. one that gave us many of the measures that were tried and used by countries in the west before the collapse of soviet union. not even acknowledging is not like ignoring more than a century of theory and a whole economic system that can and solved many problems with completely different way to completely different results. many of which I don't care to defend under any circumstances. I will be caught dead, before covering for stalin and his crimes. however many of the measures work. based on statistics at hand cuba which has pretty much the same gdp with my country of greece enjoys a better quality of life. I don't say this is the end system but maybe some ispiration is in order.
The advent of compulsory public education has drastically changed society in so many ways. It's only been a thing for 150 odd years, first with only primary/elementary, then only in the 20th century did compulsory secondary education become a thing. Having everybody be basically literate and numerate is a huge change from 200 years ago. Plus all of the great minds that would've languished without access to education.
@@DesertsOfHighfleet That's one way of looking at it, but it was not the only motivation. There was also a genuine desire to try and uplift the lower classes and give opportunity to the smart ones among them. It's all well and good to "want to be wise", but if you can't read you're going to have a hard time of it.
@@DesertsOfHighfleet Liking or not, everybody needs logical intelligence to even survive, imagine being wise without knowing how to math, for instance. Without logic, there is no way to evaluate things in life.
i’m impressed that in a video titled ‘is there a better alternative to capitalism’, that they do not mention a single alternative and pretend that ‘we don’t know’
Economists have been trying so hard about socialism, and it’s possible but politic system is really dangerous, our actual system can’t handle a economy like that. The worst part: the free market is living
@@LakeofCrystalclan i know you readed that post saying to ask people for sources 😅 And that's how brainwashed whole generation it is But anyway the channel doesn't show the real name and have to put disclaimers on videos about not being financial advisor And also in general if you do s class of any topic you make it more complete about 2 sides Also if you want to be more complete you have to add the future point of view of the topic So that's how you can identify political videos that are sad because they're missinformation
@@LakeofCrystalclan also if you want to know about economy state ik 2023 we are going to a 4th stage in capitalist But most politics economy videos like this created the idea of "late stage capitalism" just to create the illusion of "something" that could be many things but they mainly use it for get votes of people that are mad about their money But is sad they don't talk about china owning middle Africa with super strong contracts that they basically own ports airports high ways and industries of plastic and metals , do they're exporting the sweatshops china standards to Africa And that's the new phases of capitalism expanding to third world countries and avoiding contamination lawsuits because they would mask pollution levels in countries that had lower levels , and also they mask the bad work conditions like that, because African sweatshops owned by china make look good the sweatshops of china that make your sneakers and parts of phones
Towards the end you discuss the difficulty of studying economics - "you can't create an economy in a lab." Maybe unsurprisingly, that made me think of computer-based economic modelling, which I assume economists do a lot of. Those models though would have to be limited by the factors that economists imagine to be relevant. That got me wondering if anybody is applying AI to produce novel economic models that apply factors that maybe economists have not thought of. I imagine this would need to involved training AI on whatever data - economic, demographic, environmental, political.... the researchers could get their hands on. All that to say: Maybe a subject for a future video.
most MMT for examples uses models that don't take into account a persons lifespan or how spending and investing habits change over a persons life. which is huge obviously
Problem might be that current AI is fairly limited in learning and based on input....so the results are only as good as the questions asked by scientists...unless economists have access to some type of AI that can somehow go beyond that? Maybe they can ask the AI what new questions to ask it. Kind of meta! lol!
with how the economy always needs to be including new products and the changes of consumers preferences. In order to do what you are saying you would need to stop all invention. and force everyone to like the same stuff in order for it to be a theoretically solvable problem.
@@555saltnot really what they’re buying isn’t as important as how much their spending what they’re buying within reason is pretty much irrelevant actually only the dollar amount matters
No, in a resource-based economy you would not need excessive amounts of individual items as the mindset of people would change in a resource-based economy. They wouldn't need all this extra stuff. They wouldn't need a whole bunch of individualized items to maintain the status quo that serve very little purpose in their lives.
The historic period where merchants wealth outpaced the noblemen, was absolutely insane. It's one of my favorite examples whenever I talk with others about how an economic revolution would completely reshape our world, hopefully for the better of course. Imagine if what is now the middle class, suddenly had the means and the wills to gain vastly more wealth than the upper class. I cannot even describe in words how insane that would be. But it would be wild
@@animalia5554 life, in general, is about taking responsibility. There is nothing you do, that can be done, if you don't take responsibility and do it. Add it all up and you have a far greater responsibility, than what this could ever be
If you look at resposnibilty, as helping others, then that’s something I am more then willing to do. Expectations, on the other hand, is more like fitting a mold.
@@animalia5554 I agree on expectations. Most expectations are a result of social constructs that everyone just accept without question, even when they're doing more harm than good, which is particularly annoying, since all social constructs are just things we at some point sort of agreed as a society to do and then we leave it there. It's pretty f'ed and to make it worse, we probably all have our own expectations to things. Whether we choose to rely on those expectations is, of course, a matter of its own, but I believe we all have our own expectations to how things should be and then we can choose to follow them or simply use them as a guide, while relying on our responsibility to ourselves and others to craft a better future
"...I'd be collecting my Nobel prize right about now." Based on the lag time from past few Nobel prize winners in economics, I think it's more accurate to say you'd be collecting your Nobel prize in 20-30 years 😁
Some feedback, if you want to use chapters, you should indicate in the video when you transition from one chapter to the next, or summarize them at the end. I don't think you ever explicitly answered the question about infinite growth in a finite world, for example. Anyhow, good video overall, I enjoyed it. Keep up the good work.
@@IAMNOTGOODWITHCOMPUT I never understood this sentiment. Yes, literally infinite growth is not possible, but we are so early technologically speaking, as a species. We are not even a type 2 civilization on the Kardashev scale, we haven't even harnessed all of the energy on Earth, nor do we have AGI, or fusion power etc. All of those come from a mix of gov grants as well as private investment, ie modern day capitalism.
He never answers his own questions properly. I don't know does he even write his own scripts, because there is never a clean connection between the questions and the answers.
Ask not what your Wallet can do for you but what you can do for your Wallet. Fiscal responsibility is an art, acquiring wealth is a discipline. Choose what you want to purchase next month & limit yourself to only that. Don't try to save money, try not to spend it. Discipline yourself.
I look at it in this way, no matter how perfect a system is, it would still at the end of the day would be managed and enforced by humans and humans have flaws. So ultimately the performance of any system is determined by the type of people that run it.
ok, sure . However, having this in mind we can "make" for our selfs a system where these human flaws affect less (in comparison) so it is worth it to try find the "best" even though we know it will not be perfect :)
“those who think that it is not the system which we need to fear, but the danger that it might be run by bad men are naive utopians who will forever be disappointed by the socialist outcome.” - Hayek
Just a correction on the semiconductor technology part. The machines made by ASML are referred to as 'steppers' or 'scanners' or more generaly 'tools', they are then shipped to foundries like TSMC which install them into their "fabs" and use them with other "tools" to create chips.
He's being quite Eurocentric talking about amazing European and North American (Canada and USA) universities like Taiwan, South Korea and Japan's universities haven't been doing cutting-edge research
I was hoping this video would have covered other proposed economic models. The one I've heard the most about is the Doughnut model, but I'm sure there are others worth discussing. Maybe a future video? 🙂
Yeah, kinda funny how he named the video "is there a better way" just to blabber about the current system and not go into other ways. Him saying economics "can't create wealth when there is none" while banks exists speaks volumes about inadequate knowledge on the subject.
@@Coecoo im guessing you are referring to banks printing money? They are not creating wealth. Except maybe to the extent of distributing resources more efficiently. Which printing of money is independent of distributing the wealth more efficiently.
@@copacelu93 "degrowth" is BS fed to us by elites, who want to remain on top. However, there is an element of truth at the same time: if people learned that they don't have to always "up their game" to lead a fulfilled life, much could be done for society and the environment. That, however, does not have to entail an actual reduction of life quality. Some of the positive aspects conveyed by the proponents of "degrowth" can actually be achieved by simply behaving in an economically more conservative sense, i.e. not always having to have the newest gadget and chucking it after a short time. I just think it just cynical to be lectured by the rich, who travel via jet on what I should or shouldn't aspire to. If I want to and can afford it, I'll also get myself a jet to travel the world. I just don't always have to have the newest and latest model of everything. 😉
@@roberthiggins8234 banks today create credit out of nothing but faith. credit which if intelligently used creates more wealth than would have existed without it. "printing money = inflation" is an incredibly uninformed and contextually lacking understanding of today's economy.
in the early 1900's a group of scientists and engineers (known as The Technical Alliance) proposed a distribution system based not on barter, but on energy accounting.
Ah yes everything given for free with no motivational factors. Of course there would be no exploitation or corruption within such a system either. I'm not saying it can't work but it can't work solely on its own. People demonize capitalism and socialism but the truth is both are ABSOLUTELY necessary. Well of course we could let our old work until they are dead because they aren't productive members of society.
@@pedromendonca8859 There is nothing to understand Pedro because people work for money. Would you want to work for "energy"? How do you buy food? A house? A car?
"...national economies aren't going to change how they operate, just to test a theory.." Mao and his brilliant plan for the great leap forward: "hold my pijiu"
As the most recent crisis demonstrates, one of the fundamental flaws in the current system is the NEED to protect the value of fiat currency by making billions of people suffer merely to protect said currency. There's an absurd acceptance of the fact that the "sweet spot" is when people are suffering enough (to keep wages low, to keep prices low, etc), but not too much. It feels a bit like listening to a torturer explain how the man on the rack must be tortured enough, but not too much, lest he die, which would create bad ripple effects in the economy.
I think your use of the word "suffer" is deliberately misleading. And what do you mean by low wages? In Europe the minimum wage is about the 10e mark on average. I wouldn't call that suffering. If you are talking about third world countries well their wages are low because their currencies are worthless due to poor governance and business models. Looking after your currency is a good way to ensure your people don't suffer terrible unemployment
@@BuilditUK Just to use the United States as an example: our economy would never allow 100% employment of all able-to-work citizens. Unemployment is required in order to keep wages low enough to maintain ever-increasing profits with finite resources. Someone always has to "suffer" which means some of the people who are willing and able to work have to temporarily lose their access to capital at some point in order for the elite to profit.
Fiat currency is great for the wealthiest citizens of a country. It allows them to take newly printed currency and spend it before all of the country’s currency is devalued by the printing that took place.
@@laurent3415 Amen! The concept of full employment was abandoned long ago, sacrificed on the altar of inflation. They haven’t figured out how to manage economic growth without poverty acting as a counterweight. It is perverse.
The central economic problem seems somewhat flawed. There are some people that do have ultimateited desires but not all people do. There are some people that do not always need more. I know it is a generalization but I think it kind of reinforces it. People are as much a product of the systems they live in as the shapers of it.
You literally do always need more. You cannot stagnate with your intake of resources or you die off. Go without a meal for a bit, see what happens. Factual reality does not support your moral posturing.
The one who knows when enough is enough will always have enough. Mei Ling from Metal Gear Solid quoting some Chinese philosopher. There certainly are monks and other people who desire little to no things. Although they typically depend on help from other people.
As I understood it, this wasn't speaking of a need for more, but endless need. As in, each day we wake up and all over again need Food to eat, Water to drink, power to make our devices work, things to replace our things that are broken. Even if we didn't change anything, being alive is an endless need to sustain that life (food/water).
Hey mate, love your work! Quick note, the machines made by ASML are called “Lithography” machines. They are typically the most complex machine in semiconductor factories which are called “Fabs”.
Topical! Just today I topped up my ASML by £30k. Not a particularly cheap price - but I feel there's 'quality' there so I'm not as grumpy about the highish share price as I might otherwise have been....
"Once in a century" seems to be becoming "Once in a decade" slowly... We're not quite that bad yet, but we certainly seem to be working hard on it... That's the drawback of globalism that the earlier theme of mercantilism didn't suffer from. The highs are better for everyone, but the lows hit more people for much more.
I think it might be interesting if you addressed the assumption you stated about people having "infinite desires". As someone studying psychology, I don't think that's necessarily the case.
Agreed. In the sense of evolutionary desires where needs and wants change in accordance to the person and their perspective you can say that people collectively have infinite desire. This however is a distinction that I didn't see him make in the video and is a huge flaw in translating theoretical economic principals into functional socioeconomics amongst the laymen and amongst so-called experts too.
He is saying that the human race, not necessary the individual, has infinite desires. The underlying mechanism is called hedonic adaptation, which, over time and generations, accumulates to ever greater expectations for what we would accept as a minimum standard of living aka "infinite desires".
The greatest problem with capitalism is its tendency to concentrate wealth and worsen wealth and income inequality (which I note wasn't mentioned) Concentrating wealth, concentrates political power, diminishing the effectiveness of democracy.
How do you know it isn't the other way round.... Seems democracy makes it easier for permanent capitalists to change the people who make the laws on a regular basis in their favour more often. Much easier to bribe a rent boy elected leader to make a quick buck when they know they will only hold power for a few years Vs a king or dictate who has to keep his subjects happy for a lifetime.
I dont know if i believe that is a problem at all. Economic inequality is good. And i really find difficulty believing its bad in and of itself. There will always be people better at art and same with money making. Just like how people say poverty is a problem. No its not. Its just a temporary part of almost everyones life and the definition changes perpetually to keep up with our enhanced abundance. The problems are structures or beliefs that keep people entrenched rather than allowing them to change and progress themselves. Eg if someone looks at my clothing and decides not to give me a job that would have afforded me better clothing. At this point i am in a catch 22. And any such catch is deeply inefficient for progress. Scaled up it just means a society bottlenecks itself with poor beliefs. The closest thing to an economic revolution will happen when we stop trying to socialize losses to avoid individual accountability. The biggest examples of this today are abortion; Killing someone else for your mistake, corporate bailouts, and most of the intellectual culture of the US which serves little to no accountability for the practical implementation of terrible ideas. Eg fauci helping to create covid.
I had a very interesting discussion with my economics professor (who is a free market economist) on the the potential effects of strong AI on the economy. The short version is he agreed with me that if strong AI reacted its potential to remove scarcity for human necessaties then capitialism would fail as it would lead to a hyper concentration in a small number of people as it would be unnecessary for the vast majority of people to work.
"Unnecessary" is not the same as "not wanting to" though. People want things to do, like to make a dent in the world around them. Now some jobs certainly would be harder to get people to do, like cleaning, mining and other hard, dangerous jobs, but there would hardly be a lack of people working with healthcare or education; indeed people already do those jobs even though they could make a lot more doing something else. People had all kinds of jobs under socialist (or state-capitalist) regimes even when all jobs earned about the same rate of pay.
More recent evidence seems to indicate that a market system with an increasingly stronger social support system will be what is needed, or that as a private sector no longer needs hardly any labor at all the public sector can put everybody to work rebuilding the infrastructure of this country and then after that moon bases Mars bases O'Neill cylinders and generational sub light starships to other star systems
@@ertymexx ya mightve missed the point, in the society the commenter is talking about, when he says work is 'unnecessary' he means those jobs you mentioned wont exist in a scarcity-less world. People do like to do things but they would have to work for free or not work, and the few jobs in society in left are held by a couple of people, who in turn accumulate all of societies wealth. This is why people say scarcity-less capitalism is so dystopic. so uh, yeah, hes not arguing against socialism? I think thats what you thought was happening but the concept of no scarcity capitalism even being accepted as a dystopia helps to serve socialist points and movements anyway. edit: I left out a ton, look more into it though, it's an interesting brand of dystopia
To price negative externalities you need to end limited liability for corporations. Companies just like individuals must own the negative and the positive effects of their actions. To limit downside risk to investors liability insurance would need to be purchased. Insurance companies then would price in the risk of the externalities generated by a company and audit them regularly for negative externalities.
Interesting solution, however it might just have the side effect of companies not going into business. People often give more weight to risks in their calculations than they do to equal rewards.
@@dinglesworld I like insulting, it helps emotional people weasel their way out to ignore any pertinent questions validity. I mean "regularly" audited companies would mean a lot of people "looking out" for us, probably incorruptible or non-gameable somehow.
@@JaviEngineer the auditors' insurance company would be on the hook to pay for the downside risk if the company created so many negative externalities that the company they insured went bankrupt.
Another splendid episode of EE. Yes, economists should not try to forecast the future, but assess the present, as there are no dynamic laws as in physics. But you CAN create and test economic systems in the lab. It has been done since the 1960s and Vernon Smith and Daniel Kahneman, among others, deservingly got their Nobel Prize. Experiments encompass Markets, Self-Governments, Macroeconomic Policies, and many others.
Not really when what he is doing is to muddy the waters. The solutions are out there and yet he mentioned none of that. Watching this video is just going to waste every viewers' time.
Short answer (not a summary of the video): yes, but we have been conditioned into a false dichotomy so we do not consider it; much of the modern culture must change before it can be possible.
I would love to see some indy games along the lines of civilization or sim city that explore different economic models. Most games have gold as a base resource, baking capitalism into the game from the start. Maybe simulations will enable us to make progress, and get used to thinking about what options we have post-capitalism.
There's a a bunch of Country Simulator Games like Democracy 4 and Victoria 3 where you can experiment with different economic and political systems already
Gold and silver were used as medium of exchange before the advent of capitalism. And the production model used in the Civ games is really state planning: you, the player, decide what is produced and how to reinvest surplus.
If government actually cared, it would tax all extraction and negative externalities instead of taxing sales and incomes. This would get us less of what we don't want and more of what we do want.
@@christianlewis7055 it also means they wouldn't be taxed for using what's already in the system (ex recycling) though im unsure if farming would count as extraction in this case (course it would also probably lower the amount of money being given to the government which would also be undesirable)
@@christianlewis7055 Yes, that's the incentive for change isn't it? If driving a mile was 10x the cost it is, people would quickly switch to public transit and also stop building houses 50km from the city centre. The current government policies are just a way for people to subsidize their life by moving the actual costs to poorer nations, primarily through climate change and keeping the currency propped up.
I mean, economists might not be able to predict the future, but isn't a big chunk of the field about managing future risk? How can you even talk about growth without trying to predict the future?
Yeah he is extremely wrong on this, if economics didn't predict anything it would be useless. Like weather forecasts there are too many variables involved to do accurate predictions on a bigger scope, but that doesn't mean it isn't the goal to make the predictions as good as possible. (Note that I think this channel has pretty good and educational content, he is just wrong on this one)
One of the fundamental problems in Economics is the failure to distinguish between needs and desires. This often results in a society where many individuals do not have their basic needs met.
I propose a new economic model where you all give me your goods and services. In exchange for your goods and services you get nothing, which is beneficial to you because you don't have to worry about someone breaking in to your house to steal your stuff. Because you have no stuff nor a house. This will greatly decrease your stress. Additionally it removes money from the economy which cuts out market inefficiencies such as banks. This is of course very hard for me as I have to worry about you all stealing my stuff but that's a burden I am willing to carry for the good of society.
On a free market all those individual values trend towards the real cost of production. Naturally unfree markets are much more profitable for the select few suppliers who are allowed to provide products and thus the value can never reach cost. It's also why free markets trend towards ZERO profit for all parties involved.. only unfree markets can provide eternal profits.
@@ricardokowalski1579 capitalist love unfree markets... That's one of the contradictions of capitalism. A system that's supposed to be innovative and dynamic will grind to a halt in the pursuit of profit because profit from the status quo can be a conflicting interest to innovation. Therefore capitalists will often bribe politicians in order to keep the status quo. Side note: Your free market does a terrible job of incorporating negative value
Very interesting video. I am no economist but I have an idea that could address the gap you mentioned about resources and demand that could solve the issues of social, wealth and the role of the government. Happy to chat.
Nice video 👍 But I would def have liked to see some evidence for the claim “better economic theories lead to higher standards of living”. In other words, how are we sure we get the cause and effect the right way around? I could totally see technological advancements leading to transformed economies and then economists studying and explaining this post hoc. This would certainly be much more in line with how science mostly works. As a physicist myself I’m probably biased and and am open to learn, so I’m looking for a genuine response ❤
This is true but does not address the question of whether A) economists first discover better systems which then get adopted or B) better technologies enable / unlock better economic systems which then get explained post hoc by economists
@@shuikuan USSR vs United States. Both plenty of natural resources and knowledge, but one system was more efficient than the other. Since they existed at the same time, we can say the technology was the same and held constant
It's like saying better physics theories lead to better star formation. Nonsense. People are animals and they consume like animals until they destroy their ecosystem enough to cause their own collective apocalypse. Humans have the special ability to destroy ecosystems faster due to technology. Economics is a haughty, arrogant sector of a haughty, arrogant series of "disciplines" which aim to do nothing more than put navel-gazers into seats of power. Economics is an attempt by wankers to avoid the basic facts that natural resources are finite and not every person is going to get fed tomorrow.
@@musicandoutdoors Was the US policy directed by economists and their theories or was the policy developed by politicians and afterwards economists explained the effects it had? I think his question is what is the driving force? Do economist and their theories actually create or influence economies?
The story of how chips are made is fascinating and a real marvel. I think a lot of our technology is over stated, simpler principles than they would have us believe but making chips is really something.
Howard Scott, along with M. King Hubbard, Thorstien Veblin, and several other technical professionals proposed a distribution system based not on barter, but on energy accounting.
I like the concept of logistic growth, I've heard it talked about a bit lately. It doesn't even seem incompatible with capitalism, it's a reshuffling of priorities based on finite resources. It almost seems inevitable.
@@georgia2727 irrelevant to the logistics industry or the economy as a whole. With the time it takes to travel those distances anything past the asteroid belt is largely irrelevant to us even once things like extra terrestrial mining becomes viable.
Living near Seattle it's amazing to see what companies like Amazon have done. The difference between what logistics were like for shipping companies 30 years ago vs 20 years ago was night and day, then it changed a ton from 20 years ago to 10 years ago, and again in the last 10 years. Now we've got packages/deliveries that are monitored hour to hour, drivers have live dash cams and 24/7 tracking, everything feeds back to HQ, and we've got robots and machines moving things around in some large facilities. They're already starting to automate warehouses more and more so soon they'll resemble a giant vending machine with machines moving packages around automatically and we're already seeing some automated trucks moving stuff around facilities and ports.
Just a heads up, ASML makes (one of) the machines used by the fabs like TMSC. ASML’s machines are the most complex of those used to manufacture semiconductors, but they are just one among many advanced machines necessary. And the silicon wafers are just silicon (mostly). There is no mirror substrate. Zeiss might grow the silicon crystals that are sliced into wafers, but they are more of and optics company. They work in conjunction w/ ASML and focus on the optics, mirrors, and process. I’m getting into the weeds a bit, but the main takeaway is companies like TMSC are fabs. Companies like ASML and Zeiss make the machines used by fabs like TMSC, Samsung, and Intel.
Yea, when he started comparing economics to hard science and taking about the process of chip fabrication, I was having a real hard time taking anything else seriously
I loved the part where he explained mechantilism, ohh they just exported more and imported less. Like we don't know what they were doing😂😂. They were carving up foreign land and using slavery to continue their endless growth and quench for profits
I think any economic system that's considered complete would need to survive something catastrophic, such as a mining company bringing back a thousand times our global economy in refined asteroid metals from space. A complete economic system would be boosted by such a delivery and result in more productive and computational power as a result, a modern global economy would face job-ending crashes and a loss of productivity across the globe for a time.
I always find these propositions interesting. The price of platinum group metals is a function of supply and demand. I knew a 100 year old antiques dealer who could remember when aluminum and platinum opera glasses had the same cost as the process for processing aluminum cheaply had not been created yet. Once it had, aluminum plummeted. Platinum would face the same pricing pressure: if the supply were to double overnight, the price would crash. No amount of anything exists of greater value than the global economy because the per unit value would reflect the supply available.
@@es330td you only need to look at oil to see the problem with your assumption. The fact that a resource can be supplied does not mean those with control over it will supply it. The per unit value is artificially controllable, and is regularly controlled; it's only drastic changes in demand that can actually 'correct' commodities.
@@dudebros6122 Communism doesn't go against individualism and communist parties in Western countries are becoming more popular. Conservative parties are dying out
Economics crosses into production, distribution, power hierarchies, physical sciences, and social sciences so... lots of room for disagreement especially when most issues are multi-factor but attributing the prime factors in a 'scientific' way assigns blame or credit- people get perturbed.
It's not so much about what we know of economics, it's what we understand. Take for example Keynes/Hayek most economists would likely say that they argued their points, whereas I would suggest they refined each others points and both positions can be held consistently. That deeper understanding of economics isn't something that's learnt through a course but is more integrated knowledge; just as Feynman used to ask his students about refraction and then what it actually means for when he holds a piece of glass up to the light and rotates it, for economics it's about understanding what impact the theories have on the real world and how they can be coherently integrated into good policy/etc.
@@joansparky4439 I understand that, let me elaborate, it doesn't matter if do that, at the end of the day it needs implementation and I can guarantee no nation on planet earth is going to change how they operate just to test a theory. At most you'd be lucky to win the Nobel price. Which University will change what works for them.
It really feels like economics is in the state now that physics was in when those who later went on to create quantum mechanics were told there's nothing left to be learned here - wer're just chasing some last digits of some numbers, and that's it.
@@WiggaMachiavelli Dear, you don't understand economics ! go follow a graduated micro and follow the perequesite. 1) Microeconomics theory = thought experiment where conclusion follow with mathematical demonstration from a set of assumption.
I bet there is a way to model and test new economic systems using trained neural networks. Perhaps we don't have enough computing power currently to make the models realistic on a large scale though.
i would genuinely love to hear your modern take on socialism.. Maybe a well informed debate and brainstorming of ideas between various proposed models?
There's nothing wrong with implementing a few socialist policies here and there, but people need to give up on seeing it as a replacement for capitalism.
In the series Star Trek they have a post-scarcity economy where everyone has his basic needs met. As a viewer, I don't recall having heard their statements on post-scarcity, but someone collected half a dozen clips from Star Trek characters explaining their economy.
In many rich economies such as in the Skandinavien countries we are in a (more or less) post scarcity situation, large Welfare systems are established to ensure that nearly everyone has their basic needs taken care off (exept social and sexual needs).
@@leonfa259 Yes and we as a species is very close to achieve this in a global scale. We already produce more food than the world needs, we only need to find a cheap source(or storage method) of energy that doesn't destroy our environment and is renewable for the foreseeable future.
Recent studies have revealed that external motivation doesn't work. For example Grades in school. Grades make the focus less on learning for it's own sake and challenging one's self to trying to get the easiest classes to get better grades.
Similar to the video's topic. Grades may not accomplish the desired outcome, but it's the best we have so far. There have been numerous attempts to replace grading with something else, they didn't work. Grading is still the best that we've got, and I guess it's the same with external motivation.
There could be a way to test economies in a lab. During my time at university I researched virtual economies like those in MMORPGs. The trick is: People behave pretty similar in a simulated world as in a real one. And we could induce economic shocks to economies with thousands of players to see what would happen. I proposed these kinds of simluations to the European Central Bank. And while they found it fascinating, they told me they couldn‘t use these simulations. As I remember, they said that their economic models have to be deterministic (i.e. be repeatable and produce the same result). I still think virtual economies could be a new and fascinating way to research new economic theories. Maybe even a way for some machine learning algorithms to experiment rapidly and learn to present us with a better economic theory. What do you think?
That was done already decades ago, you mind want to read for example the reports of the rome club, books like Limits to Growth, etc. The problem is, it is hard to convince people who think that the earth is a squre that it actually has a round shape. Economy is a dynamic system, whose negative effects might be not noticeable right away due to the time delaying effects. So, while you can create a model showing that the capitalist production system as it is now, is not sustainable in the long term, you can't tell exactly, when you will hit that point when it will fall apart. This is the reason why the work of Marx was made fun of 100 years ago, but now it is getting less and less "laughable" in economist circles. What he did was actually to describe the capitalist production system model with words, predict its long-term negative consequences, which we all are experiencing now, but he could not tell the exact time point, when that will happen.
@@nikolaizaicev9297 thanks. Yeah, my university time was decades ago 😆. But I’d be interested if n virtual economies in computer games to research economic theories - do you have any specific sources or keywords to search for?
@@RealWorldMusicTheory Unfortunately, I do not know of any books for that. I think you can just focus on the system dynamics books, there are many economic models that were build with that. Also agent based and game theory based modelling is quite popular in the microeconomy field. Just use google scholar and use the system dynamics + economy or agent modeling + economy keywords.
Makes me remember Fukuyama Talling the History was pretty much over (a few years before twin towers went down). One important aspect always absent when you say that some people does some things better than others (the idea behind supply chain fever) is that no matter how well people do things, the system does not work in a way to cover the needs (even the Basic ones) of who actually does the things. Capitalists try their best to avoid doing so. Then it is fair to say that as much as economists can't predict the future, they can't say they work in a social science and tell a system that utterly does not even try to be the best for the Society as a whole is the best there is.
Hey! Can you make a video on Ecological Economics, that seems to question a lot of the basic assumptions of traditional economics such as the unlimited wants postulate.
Do you mean there wouldn't be someone who would always want a little more something or that the growth can't be infinite? I think that the universe is infinite and so there is no upper limit on the resources that can be used given enough time.
unlimited wants have a ceiling - it's called 'work one personally needs to do' to PRODUCE THE MEANS to satisfy those wants. A day has got 24 hours, 12 hours are roughly available for spending time to produce the means to satisfy your own wants. THIS IS A HARD LIMIT. The only way to get around this limit is by somehow "convincing" other people that they use THEIR time to produce means for YOUR wants and give them to you WITHOUT you giving them equivalent means back.. but this only works on unfree markets where involuntary exchanges happen.
@@akseli1111 the unlimited wants postulate is a postulate that makes sense in first glance, but research reveals that it may not be true. It kind of becomes a self fulfilling prophecy where it is forced down our throats. In terms of actual human needs, they are both finite and satiable (further reading: max neef’s matrix of needs and satisfies). The “want” that classical economics portrays is just a small portion of an overall rich human experience. But it is not unlimited, rather it is a conditioned behavior stemming from a social structure that emphasizes material goods over non material welfare. A society that always produces will convince its citizens that they need the stuff that is produced (Say’s law: supply creates its own demand). And that’s where ecological economics comes in and critically reevaluates the assumption that humans are insatiable and forms an economic system that moves away from unlimited growth.
The answer is in the video and its not surprising the author said economists are terrible at it. Assigning a positive value to what economists see as a negative one is the answer. We're trying it with Carbon but powerful vested interests thwart the idea before it people can see it would work. Sometimes im amazed at how simplistic economists are, a scientific field never got anywhere without thinking outside the box.
A good place for alternatives to capitalism is the UA-cam channel called Unlearning Economics. It leans pretty far left, but the guy is a proper economist with a high standard for evidence. He talks about non-capitalist theories and practical was to implement them.
There is a economic system called a resource based economy advocated by the late Jacque Fresco and Roxanne Meadows.....it may be impossible to imagine but is not improbable practically since it takes positive aspect of current capitalism and transforms them into sustainable practices, furthermore eliminating negative market externalities
the guy didn't do a fully explainable process for that system to work, he just keeps saying technology this technology that, not explaining exactly the process behind for example, how making bread will work in a resource based economy
@@royalecrafts6252well neither did marx and tens of millions starved in china, as he would've liked. unclear instructions never stop people from trying!
@LTNetjak not to mention that games actively avoid trying to realistically simulate an economy because it would both be boring to the users and less profitable for the publishers. However, Douglas's comment hints at the possibility of "laboratory conditions", create a simulation that does have as an objective to simulate the real mechanics of economics as precisely as possible and you have your lab, not to say that's easy, but I get the feeling modern AI work applied to a simulation framework capable of replicating economic models could be very useful. Games, especially online games like EVE, are still great at providing insight into the effects and impacts of Incentives (and changes in them) in large communities of independent agents, see the "corrupted blood epidemic" case.
@@LTNetjak 1: But that rock will not mine itself. And carebears will tolerate a finite amount of pwnage. 2: same with LLC - a limited liability company. Even ponzi/fraud schemes, you do your time and repeat. Theranos - a 9Billion scam 11 years of prison time only.
@LTNetjak video games are probably more important than you think. or some of them are. you just need to understand the limitations. rocks repawn in eve but as long as you keep the amount of time limited to a certain length you can find useful information. death isn't permanent but we don't usually make day to day decisions with death as a consideration so you can rule it out. even in war soldiers lives aren't spent by someone risking their life - you won't find generals in the trenches. it'll only be a matter of time until someone makes a game where the economy is the game
A game economy, machine learned into being with terabytes of actual real-world historical economic data, could prove to be an interesting way to test some things out.
@@LTNetjakyou’re right but there’s not many better ways to experiment without doing it in a real environment. Simulations can give you a lot of data on a more realistic environment but it’ll always be affected by the biases of the scientist and it does lose a bit of the human chaos that’s so hard to simulate/study without actually involving real people. They’re often better than video games but they too are flawed and biased.
The reason they don't try different economic theories is because it's not profitable to do so, we have optimized profit seeking so well that there is no need to try a new system, if anything we might have to go back to older practices that seek profits better but are more easily seen by the people in the country profiting as immoral (i.e. child labor or slavery in the imperial core not just in the victimized countries)
Exactly everything is about making money off your labour, we are entirely post scarcity, except fuel(the only reason the us even involves itself in war unless they can sell people guns), which we should be working on getting rid of in exchange for renewable energy, we actually waste more food than we consume in the USA.
Great essay. It's also important to keep in mind that in modern scientific advances, it is usually the case that new theories provide a model that explains the exceptions in a way that elaborates on the old theory rather than casting it aside. Rather than the transition from geocentrism to heliocentrism, I think a better analogy for what we may expect of future advances in economics is the transition from Newton Physics to relativity and quantum physics. Everything contained in Newtonian physics is still basically upheld for things that a working in what we consider normal conditions, but we now understand the exceptions and were able to develop a ton of new technology. I see the basic ideas of capitalism and Keynesian macroeconomics as we have it today sticking around, with new advancements providing profound insight into where those models fall short. Then too, if we move the goalposts of what we want as a society, the present system would change a lot in response to that as well.
I love how you said "you may think you know where this is going, but you don't." And then I did. As someone that's very interested in chip manufacture, I was aware of Zeiss, ASML, TSMC etc quite a while ago.
I’m a bit surprised to hear you advance the argument that capitalism comes about as a result of the absence of government regulation rather than a product of government regulation of a certain type. Markets of all kinds need government regulation to function. Where governments usually fail is either in their failure to regulate markets at all (vide the GFC) or, more often, trying to regulate price.
As he says making proper experiments in economics is almost impossible. Particularly determining the ideal controls. That's why "Social Sciences" cannot follow the scientific method (and I personally think that therefore should not be called a science). As a consequence progress in the field is slow. The example of a doctor not supposed to predict the future is used, but doctors are supposed to provide prognosis all the time, and they are usually correct. This is because we figured out how to apply the scientific method to medicine. Advances like the economic Nobel prizes of 2019 or 2021 makes me hopeful that soon a somewhat adapted scientific method may be applied to economics and we can finally call it a science
@@ravanpee1325 In my mind it's a matter of definition. The scientific method is roughly: observation, hypothesis, experimentation, results, publication. If it's impossible to perform one or several of the steps, it's not Science. That does not mean that particular field cannot be studied, you just need to use a different method, not the scientific method. It just so happens that the scientific method is particularly good.
@@javierl2671 Experiment is of course not the only scientific methode. Also a phenome doesn't have to be explained by a monocausal explanation when there are many variables
07:31 - And it's possible that tomorrow some brilliant economist(s) will come up with a system that revolutionizes the way that we manage economies to such an extent that it'll be like entering the space age.
I also support this approach, more then any other if it comes to shifting from our current to a new socioeconomic systems. I however also have it in mind, that none of a systems can function in each times the best. Everything depends on the environment we live in, technology we have available, people able to contribute to the society, social laws, and the most important - resources. Every system can work if it's applied properly to the conditions people live in. I'm not sure if we're ready to shift towards RBE today, we would need to build a proper infrastructure first in the current system, but to me RBE seems to be the most efficient system invented to solve many issues we have that are rooted in how our current socioeconomic systems work.
The core idea is competition. It allows for ones that does the best to succeed while letting the less so fail. It is the most natural way to create improvements and growth. Until we reach a point where we don’t need fast improvements and growth, then competition is always necessary. Any system that causes there to be a lack of competition(monopoly) before we reach that point would be very counterproductive.
We face brand-new issues every day. It's the new typical. We initially believed there to be a catastrophe, but now we understand there is a new normal and we must adjust. How can we increase income throughout the quantitative adjustment process in 2023, which so far appears to be a year of great economic misery across the country? I can't afford for my $280,000 in savings to disappear.
I have bad news for you. Unless you are actively growing your money it is disappearing every day. This is due to the intentional devaluation of the currency by government money printing. It’s plain stealing, and I don’t know why we let them get away with it!
It did not work then, and it will not work now. I have a sense that only the complete collapse of the capitalist system, and with it, the political system will free everyone.@@sten260
Human economic systems just reflect the most fundamental laws that govern biological systems. At the core is how our own biological system works. With this I mean: our body accumulates fat, to cover times of hunger. The mind has a built in fear of dying, hence our drive to accumulate and create "security", much like Squirrels keep a stash of nuts for the winter. We just have taken this to another level, were people collect art and yachts worth way more than you need to survive, but the driver is the same biological instinct, which in may opinion cannot be switched off. There are biological systems in nature that cooperate (ants, bees) but only to the extent were it serves the individual (so, some kind of "communism"), but that will never work 100% with humans, because we do have big differences individually. Some of us run faster, think faster, have a greater memory - either by nature or nurture - for some it is easier to learn a new language. That is why communism never worked and never will! (Why should the fastest Gazelle slow down to the pace of the sick and old? Why should someone that is smarter, more creative, make the same money as someone that has no such skills?). Right now we don't even have pure capitalism (Profits are privatized and Losses are socialized - saving Banks or big Corps with Tax money), which is not right. Limited resources and human nature will probably always create a mix between capitalism and some form of socialism, mirroring what happens in nature.
To my (arguably rather small) knowledge, and while details can vary, the outlines are rather simple: Centralization vs individualism, this being a spectrum; IMHO, a working, well developed country would benefit more from increasing their welfare state and people-oriented, while a developing country basically has to be more "liberal" and be company-centric. Though, of course, both have to guarantee either has space to both grow and a place to stand (thats where the details come in) So far, I know of no other system that works well enough. We might perhaps someday stumble upon one, but up until know, that is what we have; The aforementioned spectrum can head more towards socialism or more towards capitalism, but it would never be purely any of the two. And more extreme and outlier forms of govt are much more short lived and tend to rely on a far more oligarchic or even authoritarian Maybe im wrong, Idk, but so far no one ever showed me something better As for infinite growth.... Idk honestly. At the very least we should head towards automation and better quality of life regardless of the system, but I believe there are limits only curtailed by volatility/swings. I dont think its wise to have access to more resources than we have
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How much did you get paid to promote the climate hoax?
@@antikokalis Oh do grow up you tedious kangaroo kak
I am legitimately impressed that the words "socialism" or "communism" aren't mentioned in this video but mercantilism is lol
Glad mercantilism got a shoutout! In these uncertain times when capitalism is assumed to be the only model that can work, however horrible and unequal it might be, we need more awareness of mercantilism!
Because communism doesn't work neither does socialism.
Isnt mercantilism proto capitalism? I doubt there is anything better than capitalism. Not state capitalism,socialism and communism cannot be good alternatives
The original definition of socialism is replacement for capitalism before they came up with the best replacement is seize the means of production.
Socialism is when the means of production are owned by the community. Was this ever truly the case in some country with modern economics and did not work?
Not so long ago, just after having received my degree on Biology and entering the work force, I started to study economics and finances on my own. My goals were (and still are):
1. Learn to optimize the way I allocate the capital at my disposal.
2. Have enough knowledge to be able to understand contracts before I sign them and (hopefully) stay away from bad deals and/or frauds.
One of the first things that "felt wrong" was the amount of economists that take their field "too seriously" (as if it was a natural science instead of a social one), and preaching their beliefs and dogmas as if they were absolute scientific truths.
Thats completely true. I did a bachelors in engineering and changed my field with a masters in economics and I was struck by the way they even call it a science when almost nothing can be experimented in real life. However, as you say, they go around claiming that their ideas would work best as if it would be 100% true.
They also use math in a conceptual way instead of us in engineering fields.
Besides this, learning economics is super interesting and it allows me to put the puzzle pieces in place in my head and the fact that I know how the system works will hopefully make me able to turn this knowledge into an andvantage.
Finally science people United.
Just like archeologists say their findings are facts
It feels like economics is less of a science and more of just an example of game theory.
Couldn’t agree more. But what I found quite disturbing was the power economics and finance have on all other fields of study, especially science. They decide who gets what resources. A scientist could invent or innovate away, the middlemen that market and finance his invention ends up with 90% of the proceeds. I just thought that was unfair. Maybe scientists should all take compulsory lessons in finance and economics.
i believe that capitalism originally meant "what is most demanded by the market." but as soon as Edward Bernays blew open the box of advertising and propaganda, capitalism changed to simply "creation of demand."
I checked the "Family and Education" section
EVERY
SINGLE
TIME
@@leoniduvarov6565 if you create a problem that did not exist before then yes, you can. If you convince a big enough group about something, the people not following the trend will seem weird and end up conforming as well.
@@leoniduvarov6565except you can exploit someone’s herd mentality biologically hard wired like there is a culture of buying stuff and because of that you are gonna buy it if someone you love/are friends with you are wired to want to have that so you are on the same level as them and also you kind of have to like within the feasibility of everyone else in short yes yes you do need to buy things
@@w花bexactly
I feel like you hit the nail right on the coffin with that statement. ⚰️
08:06 - The idea of mercantilism was that an economy should try and export as much as possible while importing as little as possible because that way you could accumulate as much gold as possible.
I think that the core problem is that economics is only one half of the issue. The other is politics or rather the political shape of society what it considers important and so on. That interacts with economics and shapes what economic questions are important.
close.. economics is about the gathering / conversion / production and consumption of resources by a work sharing / specialized community that is being governed by rules that provide personal freedom and private property as principles every participant can count on.
But this rule enforcing mechanism can also enforce rules that benefit a few at the cost of the rest.. now guess what some of us do?
The main problem is human nature. In the end every system is against human nature. If you really want a fair game then there should be neither a political, economical or justice system. Anarchy is the most dangerous but also the most natural way of life.
@@laaaliiiluuu nah bruh ppl been in communities forever so to say anarchy is the "natural way" is incorrect, even cavemen have basic social systems
There are no more "classical" economists. The so-called economists of today are really 'political economists', concerned only about redistributing income/wealth from the more productive to the less productive.
The issue is thinking one is different from the other in the first place.
Your video reminds me about how in the late 19th century they thought physics was solved. Every major phenomenon that could be seen could be explained by classical physics. There were just these tiny little discrepancies here and there like the fact that Mercury's orbit was a little off (later explained by Einstein's theory or relativity) or the fact that radiation was behaving a little oddly (later explained by quantum mechanics). Physicists despaired that there were no go problems left to solve.
reminds me of this: "There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened." - Douglas Adams
Except physicists haven't thought like that in many decades.
@@SolomonUcko He's not a physicist, he did English at Cambridge. He doesn't know what he's saying
@@jasonhaven7170 Douglas Adams was a comedic writer, he knew exactly what he was saying. The disconnect is that you've interpreted this quote as a serious scientific postulate.
@@frozenchicken418 a better one would be the pursuit of knowledge as climbing a wall to shoot an arrow into another and climb that wall, forever repeating
Question: "Is There a Better Economic System than Capitalism?"
Answer: "I don't know."
Thanks EE
Sometimes, “I don’t know” is the correct answer. He shouldn’t pretend to have an answer if he doesn’t.
@@jasonjungreis203 Not in this case though. He could have showed different takes on what has been tried and some theories instead of a brief history of mercantilism and capitalism
@@sedatmehmed4371 The question was, if there's a better economic system (as in, allowing more growth and wealth). Which there isn't. Communism and socialism has been tried and it achieves worse results. So there is no better system currently than Capitalism.
@@BeSk9991 Communism was never tried and things become much better in Scandinavia where they included socialist elements. So yes, there is a lot to be discussed
@@sedatmehmed4371 well true capitalism was never tried either, soo it is actually the best system
"We cant predict the future and dont really know much about what we're doing, this is the best we've got." Feels kinda like the world is built on hopes and dreams.
Hopes and dreams are what drive people to make a better world 🙂
That is quite literally the opposite of hopes and dreams
The only issue with calling economics a science, is the meaning of science which is a process that makes predictions off of repeatable results. Economics is primarily case studies so it doesn’t get any chances to concretely test it’s theories.
Perhaps economics is as much a science as astronomy, which also can't make predictions of repeatable experimentation? Instead both rely on making predictions, then making observations to determine if those predictions are supported or not.
I think it's interesting to look at the languages of each. The hard sciences use mathematics which has rules and relationships while economics uses a lot of statistics with averages and outliers.
@@mattackerson6728 As a basis Astronomy uses physics, chemistry... etc to breakdown pretty much everything in outspace. So its kind of a subset of these other fields of study and can be put into repeatable experiments for example a planet orbiting a star will not stop orbiting unless a force is acted upon said planet causing an outward or inward spiral. If anything Economics is more akin to a social science like psychology where you try to predict human behaviours as an agregate, but becomes a pseudoscience when you try looking at the individual level like cognitive psychology.
Soft sciences still use the scientific method, it's just harder to create experiments and verify things through experimentation. Not calling economics a science would be like not calling advanced particle physics a science because both are difficult to test. There are also cases where case studies convieniently happen to be control and variable experiments by chance.
Would be easier to do actual economic experiments if we had a based authoritarian government
What weirds me out to this day in economic science (as a former STEM major) is just that the field has quite a lot of formulas where you plug in values to calculate something or other. Then you go ask your profs where those values come from and he honestly tells you that someone just comes up with them and they approximately match what they expect to come out of the formula. And those values and formulas change every couple years...
Can you even honestly call something like that a science?
@@GiRR007 of course, science is all about modeling the world with hypothesis and checking them. The fact that modes change is a sign of good health in a scientific field. If things progress into entrenched dogma, progress stagnates and science starves
That's how I feel about mathematics, someone just makes it up and it works
I am joking of course.
All disciplines use tools to make measurements, and those measurements are then put into models. No measuring tools are perfect, and nor, in principle, can they ever be (particularly in a quantum universe). We need to realise that there are hidden ideologies in our measuring tools and also our theories. As finite beings, it couldn't be any other way. That's fine, as long as we are aware of it.
The problem with most of the social sciences is that a lot of the measuring is done by very fallible, very ideologically driven humans using things like surveys, where you are basically inventing data because doing properly randomised control tests is economically or morally impossible. Even then it wouldn't be so bad but most of the participants actively try and hide this fact, including when you ask questions as a fellow academic at academic conferences. Everyone looks at you like you are a murderer when you bring up such issues. It is truly depressing.
The problem isn’t with using mathematical models as a tool; it’s the set of assumptions built into the models and how those assumptions often do not reflect economic reality that is the core issue. Assumptions around markets always reaching equilibrium or economic agents acting rationally to maximize utility are faulty and misguided- and lead to models that do a poor job of prediction and guiding sound economic policy. Trends in the discipline such as behavioral economics are beginning to challenge these assumptions and replace them with more sound premises - but we have a long way to go before these trends are formalized as rigorous, quantifiable models.
Economists are the one set of professionals who continuously get it wrong and never get fired.
What about the weather reporter? 😆
Any career dealing with forecasting faces this, economists aren’t psychic
The thing is, they don't actually care if it's "wrong" because they serve ruling class interests. The economists have always been right when it comes to the rich getting richer, they just pretend they care about the welfare of all and when their theories fall flat they just shrug their shoulders and say "oh well". Mainstream economics is there to enrich the wealthy while convincing the poor they are being considered 🤣
@@chillaxter13 They get it right more than they get it wrong
@@chillaxter13 They are right 80% of the time lol.
I think you forgot about the people who got the short end of the the stick
It's giving privileged bootlicker energy ngl
Every video when EE doesn't peddle a fine art scam is a W in my book
Are you referring to MasterWorks? Lol.
@@otrebla8944 I don't even have to mention it for you know to what I mean
@@IamMrSimQnyeah it’s pretty gross.
I suspect its the next established titles
You guys simply don't get it. EE's *Brilliant* use of "W" is an *Audible* lesson which he is *Skillshare (ing)* this reminder of the speculative frenzy in 17th-century Holland; Tulipmania - a kind of mass delusion, a frenzy for tulips which over time, and took the economy of Europe down like a *Nord VPN* node. One must be living in a vacant *SquareSpace* not to see how UA-cam creators all think they can get rich - thus taking the Worlds economy down with them, to a point we're re all just left with one *Dollar Shave Club* in our pockets.
What I found missing here was a recognition of the role of politics in deciding which economic theory is *applied*. Living in a country which has declined over decades of neoliberal destruction of the state in favour of rigged markets, its clear that one of economics' greatest challenges is that the motivations of those that implement its theories, and bankroll its theorists, need to be taken into account. Economics' unfortunate insistence that it is a "science" plays into this problem, by helping obscure the political dimensions to its arguments.
"nobody can tell the future, least f all economists"
"is there a better economic system than capitalism?"
"idk"
well done mate
Well sometimes it's better to admit a group don't know rather than clasp onto straws and argue that some obscure form of socialism is this answer, as no one can honestly know for sure, just as if you'd ask a king or his court what the next system in the 1500 his only honest answer is 'i dont know'. Economist are not tarot readers and anyone who says they know the future of a particular field is probably not well enough read on the subject to know the basics or worse potentially a shill of some kind. If people are wondering a certain question but no one has the answer to it do you think it's better to admit a blind spot in a field of study or to Lie and offer up hypotheticals instead?
May I ask what is your knowledge level on economics? And bonus points if it isn't copied from online amateurs with certain political points to make. I used to stupidly believe that abolition of the housing market would fix homelessness because of online communicators, however that communicator didn't know basic economics (they are however smart in areas that they specialise in) but for several reason all this isn't true at all, the most basic being- you need a exchange of housing as different stages of life need different housing, you can't bring up a family in a flat designed for some 18 yr old uni student.
【ｖａｐｏｒｗａｖｅ ｓｏｃｉａｌｉｓｍ】
Nice rainworld pfp
thanks
thanks
Thank you for the Portuguese audio option
Eu tava confusa de como o audio era em português mas tinha tantos comentários em inglês 😂 não sabia que o UA-cam tinha essa opção
@@TheNandagc 😅
BRAZIL MENTIONED LETSGOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
The thing is, that from my understanding of my field, economics is not just about studying the economy but almost every other social interaction aswell.
Economics is all about utility of the society. Therefore we just use economic Situations, since it is a easy way to put things into numbers and values, that can be calculated
Well, not really. Many disciplines can be broad enough to apply to all society. But once that happens, it loses all value. Economics is simply the study of the allocation of scare resources. It studies what to produce, how to produce it, and for whom.
@@ollielon5926 this is the common definition. But models like hendersons spatial eqilibrium are about all utility of are presentative inhabitant. So the allocation of the ‚scarce people‘ can only be understood, if all sources of utility are looked at.
Also macroeconomists will not agree either, since the effects in the aggregate are much different an often have to be looked at through an institutional lense
A real economy calculates nature, resources and human social sciences together. As we can see better in the presentation by Peter Joseph called "Economic Calculation in a Natural Law Resource Based Economy." See for yourself. Doesn't it make more sense than the monetary-market system of capitalists looking to profit off of everything?
I think the easiest way to account for your critique is to say that, rather than a study of value, things of value and their allocation, economics can also be understood as a study of incentives. I.e. how do people make decisions, what influences their decisions and how to make systems which result in better decisions being made? What incentivizes corruption or crime for instance, or how do we get people to cooperate and make compromises? What is a good justice system or a good electoral system? All of these are very much problems that, while less mainstream in economics, can absolutely be tackled with economic tools.
@@viktator4205 this is absolutly true. Well said!
I have often said, as an un-degreed historian, that "soft technology" advances are often overlooked. Along with your thesis here about Economics, I would also include such woefully underappreciated soft technology such as filling systems (filing cabinets, manila folders, serial numbers) and library organization (Dewey Decimal, etc.).
I feel that this video though ignores and communism in general which basically ignores the other tried alternative of the last century. one that gave us many of the measures that were tried and used by countries in the west before the collapse of soviet union. not even acknowledging is not like ignoring more than a century of theory and a whole economic system that can and solved many problems with completely different way to completely different results. many of which I don't care to defend under any circumstances. I will be caught dead, before covering for stalin and his crimes. however many of the measures work. based on statistics at hand cuba which has pretty much the same gdp with my country of greece enjoys a better quality of life.
I don't say this is the end system but maybe some ispiration is in order.
Did you read Tim Harford's Fifty Inventions That Made The Modern Economy?
The advent of compulsory public education has drastically changed society in so many ways. It's only been a thing for 150 odd years, first with only primary/elementary, then only in the 20th century did compulsory secondary education become a thing. Having everybody be basically literate and numerate is a huge change from 200 years ago. Plus all of the great minds that would've languished without access to education.
@@DesertsOfHighfleet That's one way of looking at it, but it was not the only motivation. There was also a genuine desire to try and uplift the lower classes and give opportunity to the smart ones among them. It's all well and good to "want to be wise", but if you can't read you're going to have a hard time of it.
@@DesertsOfHighfleet Liking or not, everybody needs logical intelligence to even survive, imagine being wise without knowing how to math, for instance. Without logic, there is no way to evaluate things in life.
i’m impressed that in a video titled ‘is there a better alternative to capitalism’, that they do not mention a single alternative and pretend that ‘we don’t know’
Exactly
Economists have been trying so hard about socialism, and it’s possible but politic system is really dangerous, our actual system can’t handle a economy like that.
The worst part: the free market is living
This is a leftists propaganda Channel you can tell this is not even economist narrating the video 😅
It's silly
@@LakeofCrystalclan i know you readed that post saying to ask people for sources 😅
And that's how brainwashed whole generation it is
But anyway the channel doesn't show the real name and have to put disclaimers on videos about not being financial advisor
And also in general if you do s class of any topic you make it more complete about 2 sides
Also if you want to be more complete you have to add the future point of view of the topic
So that's how you can identify political videos that are sad because they're missinformation
@@LakeofCrystalclan also if you want to know about economy state ik 2023 we are going to a 4th stage in capitalist
But most politics economy videos like this created the idea of "late stage capitalism" just to create the illusion of "something" that could be many things but they mainly use it for get votes of people that are mad about their money
But is sad they don't talk about china owning middle Africa with super strong contracts that they basically own ports airports high ways and industries of plastic and metals , do they're exporting the sweatshops china standards to Africa
And that's the new phases of capitalism expanding to third world countries and avoiding contamination lawsuits because they would mask pollution levels in countries that had lower levels , and also they mask the bad work conditions like that, because African sweatshops owned by china make look good the sweatshops of china that make your sneakers and parts of phones
Towards the end you discuss the difficulty of studying economics - "you can't create an economy in a lab." Maybe unsurprisingly, that made me think of computer-based economic modelling, which I assume economists do a lot of. Those models though would have to be limited by the factors that economists imagine to be relevant. That got me wondering if anybody is applying AI to produce novel economic models that apply factors that maybe economists have not thought of. I imagine this would need to involved training AI on whatever data - economic, demographic, environmental, political.... the researchers could get their hands on.
All that to say: Maybe a subject for a future video.
most MMT for examples uses models that don't take into account a persons lifespan or how spending and investing habits change over a persons life. which is huge obviously
Problem might be that current AI is fairly limited in learning and based on input....so the results are only as good as the questions asked by scientists...unless economists have access to some type of AI that can somehow go beyond that? Maybe they can ask the AI what new questions to ask it. Kind of meta! lol!
with how the economy always needs to be including new products and the changes of consumers preferences. In order to do what you are saying you would need to stop all invention. and force everyone to like the same stuff in order for it to be a theoretically solvable problem.
@@555saltnot really what they’re buying isn’t as important as how much their spending what they’re buying within reason is pretty much irrelevant actually only the dollar amount matters
No, in a resource-based economy you would not need excessive amounts of individual items as the mindset of people would change in a resource-based economy. They wouldn't need all this extra stuff. They wouldn't need a whole bunch of individualized items to maintain the status quo that serve very little purpose in their lives.
The historic period where merchants wealth outpaced the noblemen, was absolutely insane. It's one of my favorite examples whenever I talk with others about how an economic revolution would completely reshape our world, hopefully for the better of course. Imagine if what is now the middle class, suddenly had the means and the wills to gain vastly more wealth than the upper class. I cannot even describe in words how insane that would be. But it would be wild
Sounds like too much responsibility if you ask me.
@@animalia5554 life, in general, is about taking responsibility. There is nothing you do, that can be done, if you don't take responsibility and do it. Add it all up and you have a far greater responsibility, than what this could ever be
@@Arterexius Perhaps, Expectations would have been a better word choice then responsibility. As it’s a subtle but distinct difference.
If you look at resposnibilty, as helping others, then that’s something I am more then willing to do. Expectations, on the other hand, is more like fitting a mold.
@@animalia5554 I agree on expectations. Most expectations are a result of social constructs that everyone just accept without question, even when they're doing more harm than good, which is particularly annoying, since all social constructs are just things we at some point sort of agreed as a society to do and then we leave it there. It's pretty f'ed and to make it worse, we probably all have our own expectations to things. Whether we choose to rely on those expectations is, of course, a matter of its own, but I believe we all have our own expectations to how things should be and then we can choose to follow them or simply use them as a guide, while relying on our responsibility to ourselves and others to craft a better future
"...I'd be collecting my Nobel prize right about now." Based on the lag time from past few Nobel prize winners in economics, I think it's more accurate to say you'd be collecting your Nobel prize in 20-30 years 😁
Perhaps that much time is needed to see if the theory is valid.
Or the modern crop of economists tend to fall into political camps.
even Bernanke got one.. cant be that hard (jk)
Some feedback, if you want to use chapters, you should indicate in the video when you transition from one chapter to the next, or summarize them at the end. I don't think you ever explicitly answered the question about infinite growth in a finite world, for example. Anyhow, good video overall, I enjoyed it. Keep up the good work.
That was a rhetorical question, limitless growth in a limited world is never going to be possible by definition of terms
He actually answers it almost immediately, at 4:35. It was an offhand comment, although probably an obvious answer
@@IAMNOTGOODWITHCOMPUT I never understood this sentiment. Yes, literally infinite growth is not possible, but we are so early technologically speaking, as a species. We are not even a type 2 civilization on the Kardashev scale, we haven't even harnessed all of the energy on Earth, nor do we have AGI, or fusion power etc. All of those come from a mix of gov grants as well as private investment, ie modern day capitalism.
@@zzzyyyxxx close to type 2 more like not even close to 1 😭
He never answers his own questions properly. I don't know does he even write his own scripts, because there is never a clean connection between the questions and the answers.
Ask not what your Wallet can do for you but what you can do for your Wallet. Fiscal responsibility is an art, acquiring wealth is a discipline. Choose what you want to purchase next month & limit yourself to only that. Don't try to save money, try not to spend it. Discipline yourself.
I look at it in this way, no matter how perfect a system is, it would still at the end of the day would be managed and enforced by humans and humans have flaws. So ultimately the performance of any system is determined by the type of people that run it.
This is the answer. Humans are bound for self destruction if we don’t realize that we have to raise better children and be better people.
ok, sure . However, having this in mind we can "make" for our selfs a system where these human flaws affect less (in comparison) so it is worth it to try find the "best" even though we know it will not be perfect :)
The best System is able to take flaws into Account. Hence why Power is divided in our nations. And hence why communism simply cannot work.
Imagine If they Apply this logic to airplane safety well If It fall It Falls humans have flaws😂😂😂
“those who think that it is not the system which we need to fear, but the danger that it might be run by bad men are naive utopians who will forever be disappointed by the socialist outcome.” - Hayek
Just a correction on the semiconductor technology part. The machines made by ASML are referred to as 'steppers' or 'scanners' or more generaly 'tools', they are then shipped to foundries like TSMC which install them into their "fabs" and use them with other "tools" to create chips.
Yeah I thought that sounded odd as he was saying it.
Also Intel is a Chip Designer and Fab. They don’t really send any designs to TSMC to make. Only their non existent failure of Arc GPUs.
@@rbaile508 Intel can't make their smallest and most advanced chips they designed. They get TSMC to make it for them like many others who just design.
He's being quite Eurocentric talking about amazing European and North American (Canada and USA) universities like Taiwan, South Korea and Japan's universities haven't been doing cutting-edge research
Also the rare earth minerals are mined by child slaves in Africa. Are we still talking about capitalism???
I was hoping this video would have covered other proposed economic models. The one I've heard the most about is the Doughnut model, but I'm sure there are others worth discussing.
Maybe a future video? 🙂
Degrowth and Doughnut are really cool and I'd love a video on them as well
Yeah, kinda funny how he named the video "is there a better way" just to blabber about the current system and not go into other ways. Him saying economics "can't create wealth when there is none" while banks exists speaks volumes about inadequate knowledge on the subject.
@@Coecoo im guessing you are referring to banks printing money? They are not creating wealth. Except maybe to the extent of distributing resources more efficiently. Which printing of money is independent of distributing the wealth more efficiently.
@@copacelu93 "degrowth" is BS fed to us by elites, who want to remain on top.
However, there is an element of truth at the same time: if people learned that they don't have to always "up their game" to lead a fulfilled life, much could be done for society and the environment. That, however, does not have to entail an actual reduction of life quality. Some of the positive aspects conveyed by the proponents of "degrowth" can actually be achieved by simply behaving in an economically more conservative sense, i.e. not always having to have the newest gadget and chucking it after a short time.
I just think it just cynical to be lectured by the rich, who travel via jet on what I should or shouldn't aspire to. If I want to and can afford it, I'll also get myself a jet to travel the world. I just don't always have to have the newest and latest model of everything. 😉
@@roberthiggins8234 banks today create credit out of nothing but faith. credit which if intelligently used creates more wealth than would have existed without it. "printing money = inflation" is an incredibly uninformed and contextually lacking understanding of today's economy.
in the early 1900's a group of scientists and engineers (known as The Technical Alliance) proposed a distribution system based not on barter, but on energy accounting.
Ok as a builder... how would that work?
Ah yes everything given for free with no motivational factors. Of course there would be no exploitation or corruption within such a system either.
I'm not saying it can't work but it can't work solely on its own. People demonize capitalism and socialism but the truth is both are ABSOLUTELY necessary. Well of course we could let our old work until they are dead because they aren't productive members of society.
The technocratic movement, which is the wet dream of the elite.
maybe someone could do a simulation game to help understand these models
@@pedromendonca8859 There is nothing to understand Pedro because people work for money.
Would you want to work for "energy"? How do you buy food? A house? A car?
"...national economies aren't going to change how they operate, just to test a theory.." Mao and his brilliant plan for the great leap forward: "hold my pijiu"
Mao didn’t kill enough birds and that’s why communism failed in china
And it worked out great....
"so uh basically we gonna have our farmer society build their own makeshift factories. yeah."
Mao: steel = economy
Farmer peasants: guess we'll eat air for dinner
Except it's even worse because he didn't test a theory...the theory already failed in the Soviet Union by that point!
As the most recent crisis demonstrates, one of the fundamental flaws in the current system is the NEED to protect the value of fiat currency by making billions of people suffer merely to protect said currency. There's an absurd acceptance of the fact that the "sweet spot" is when people are suffering enough (to keep wages low, to keep prices low, etc), but not too much. It feels a bit like listening to a torturer explain how the man on the rack must be tortured enough, but not too much, lest he die, which would create bad ripple effects in the economy.
I think your use of the word "suffer" is deliberately misleading. And what do you mean by low wages? In Europe the minimum wage is about the 10e mark on average. I wouldn't call that suffering. If you are talking about third world countries well their wages are low because their currencies are worthless due to poor governance and business models. Looking after your currency is a good way to ensure your people don't suffer terrible unemployment
@@BuilditUK Just to use the United States as an example: our economy would never allow 100% employment of all able-to-work citizens. Unemployment is required in order to keep wages low enough to maintain ever-increasing profits with finite resources. Someone always has to "suffer" which means some of the people who are willing and able to work have to temporarily lose their access to capital at some point in order for the elite to profit.
Fiat currency is great for the wealthiest citizens of a country. It allows them to take newly printed currency and spend it before all of the country’s currency is devalued by the printing that took place.
well said
@@laurent3415 Amen! The concept of full employment was abandoned long ago, sacrificed on the altar of inflation.
They haven’t figured out how to manage economic growth without poverty acting as a counterweight.
It is perverse.
The central economic problem seems somewhat flawed. There are some people that do have ultimateited desires but not all people do. There are some people that do not always need more. I know it is a generalization but I think it kind of reinforces it. People are as much a product of the systems they live in as the shapers of it.
You literally do always need more. You cannot stagnate with your intake of resources or you die off. Go without a meal for a bit, see what happens. Factual reality does not support your moral posturing.
The one who knows when enough is enough will always have enough. Mei Ling from Metal Gear Solid quoting some Chinese philosopher. There certainly are monks and other people who desire little to no things. Although they typically depend on help from other people.
As I understood it, this wasn't speaking of a need for more, but endless need. As in, each day we wake up and all over again need Food to eat, Water to drink, power to make our devices work, things to replace our things that are broken. Even if we didn't change anything, being alive is an endless need to sustain that life (food/water).
@@user-gz8zo5vo9l Unending for the living maybe, but not endless, which many a capitalist are naive to.
Trueeeeee
Hey mate, love your work! Quick note, the machines made by ASML are called “Lithography” machines. They are typically the most complex machine in semiconductor factories which are called “Fabs”.
Topical! Just today I topped up my ASML by £30k. Not a particularly cheap price - but I feel there's 'quality' there so I'm not as grumpy about the highish share price as I might otherwise have been....
This will be so ironic when the next once-in-a-century financial crisis hits
"Once in a century" seems to be becoming "Once in a decade" slowly... We're not quite that bad yet, but we certainly seem to be working hard on it... That's the drawback of globalism that the earlier theme of mercantilism didn't suffer from. The highs are better for everyone, but the lows hit more people for much more.
@@chillaxter13 I think it's the drawback of central banking - crises delayed but exacerbated
It already is hitting.
Aka 2020😂
The speculation bubble will pop one after another
I think it might be interesting if you addressed the assumption you stated about people having "infinite desires". As someone studying psychology, I don't think that's necessarily the case.
Agreed.
In the sense of evolutionary desires where needs and wants change in accordance to the person and their perspective you can say that people collectively have infinite desire. This however is a distinction that I didn't see him make in the video and is a huge flaw in translating theoretical economic principals into functional socioeconomics amongst the laymen and amongst so-called experts too.
All it takes is for a single person to have infinite disires for the total amount of desires to be infinite, even if the average person might not.
He is saying that the human race, not necessary the individual, has infinite desires.
The underlying mechanism is called hedonic adaptation, which, over time and generations, accumulates to ever greater expectations for what we would accept as a minimum standard of living aka "infinite desires".
It is demonstrably false lol economists are out of touch especially capitalist economists.
Most of our desires today are the result of modern marketing, they are not an inevitable aspect of human nature just something we have engineered.
The greatest problem with capitalism is its tendency to concentrate wealth and worsen wealth and income inequality (which I note wasn't mentioned) Concentrating wealth, concentrates political power, diminishing the effectiveness of democracy.
How do you know it isn't the other way round.... Seems democracy makes it easier for permanent capitalists to change the people who make the laws on a regular basis in their favour more often. Much easier to bribe a rent boy elected leader to make a quick buck when they know they will only hold power for a few years Vs a king or dictate who has to keep his subjects happy for a lifetime.
But that's a problem that all economic systems face, it happened under socialism, communisms, monarchies and empires.
I dont know if i believe that is a problem at all. Economic inequality is good. And i really find difficulty believing its bad in and of itself.
There will always be people better at art and same with money making.
Just like how people say poverty is a problem. No its not. Its just a temporary part of almost everyones life and the definition changes perpetually to keep up with our enhanced abundance.
The problems are structures or beliefs that keep people entrenched rather than allowing them to change and progress themselves.
Eg if someone looks at my clothing and decides not to give me a job that would have afforded me better clothing. At this point i am in a catch 22. And any such catch is deeply inefficient for progress. Scaled up it just means a society bottlenecks itself with poor beliefs.
The closest thing to an economic revolution will happen when we stop trying to socialize losses to avoid individual accountability.
The biggest examples of this today are abortion; Killing someone else for your mistake, corporate bailouts, and most of the intellectual culture of the US which serves little to no accountability for the practical implementation of terrible ideas. Eg fauci helping to create covid.
@@josephvictory9536 capitalists try not to be brainwashed challenge, level impossible
Socialism make all the people poor that not solution. Capitalism with some socialism attitude is best
This was really well done, much appreciated 👍🏾
This is a great idea for a series of videos about alternatives, I'd definitely be interested in that 😊
I had a very interesting discussion with my economics professor (who is a free market economist) on the the potential effects of strong AI on the economy. The short version is he agreed with me that if strong AI reacted its potential to remove scarcity for human necessaties then capitialism would fail as it would lead to a hyper concentration in a small number of people as it would be unnecessary for the vast majority of people to work.
"Unnecessary" is not the same as "not wanting to" though. People want things to do, like to make a dent in the world around them. Now some jobs certainly would be harder to get people to do, like cleaning, mining and other hard, dangerous jobs, but there would hardly be a lack of people working with healthcare or education; indeed people already do those jobs even though they could make a lot more doing something else. People had all kinds of jobs under socialist (or state-capitalist) regimes even when all jobs earned about the same rate of pay.
Very interesting. Could you expand on that?
At the end it is clear that a planned economy is the best system that we could have, but only if it is applied with enough cybernetic means.
More recent evidence seems to indicate that a market system with an increasingly stronger social support system will be what is needed, or that as a private sector no longer needs hardly any labor at all the public sector can put everybody to work rebuilding the infrastructure of this country and then after that moon bases Mars bases O'Neill cylinders and generational sub light starships to other star systems
@@ertymexx ya mightve missed the point, in the society the commenter is talking about, when he says work is 'unnecessary' he means those jobs you mentioned wont exist in a scarcity-less world. People do like to do things but they would have to work for free or not work, and the few jobs in society in left are held by a couple of people, who in turn accumulate all of societies wealth. This is why people say scarcity-less capitalism is so dystopic. so uh, yeah, hes not arguing against socialism? I think thats what you thought was happening but the concept of no scarcity capitalism even being accepted as a dystopia helps to serve socialist points and movements anyway.
edit: I left out a ton, look more into it though, it's an interesting brand of dystopia
To price negative externalities you need to end limited liability for corporations. Companies just like individuals must own the negative and the positive effects of their actions. To limit downside risk to investors liability insurance would need to be purchased. Insurance companies then would price in the risk of the externalities generated by a company and audit them regularly for negative externalities.
Interesting solution, however it might just have the side effect of companies not going into business. People often give more weight to risks in their calculations than they do to equal rewards.
How would you incentivize pure hearted Auditors?
What a clown...
@@JaviEngineer Such a petty insult. I’m sure he’s heard worse from better people.
@@dinglesworld I like insulting, it helps emotional people weasel their way out to ignore any pertinent questions validity.
I mean "regularly" audited companies would mean a lot of people "looking out" for us, probably incorruptible or non-gameable somehow.
@@JaviEngineer the auditors' insurance company would be on the hook to pay for the downside risk if the company created so many negative externalities that the company they insured went bankrupt.
Another splendid episode of EE. Yes, economists should not try to forecast the future, but assess the present, as there are no dynamic laws as in physics. But you CAN create and test economic systems in the lab. It has been done since the 1960s and Vernon Smith and Daniel Kahneman, among others, deservingly got their Nobel Prize. Experiments encompass Markets, Self-Governments, Macroeconomic Policies, and many others.
I love these more philosophical/open-ended video topics. It's good to recognize when we don't have all the answers.
Not really when what he is doing is to muddy the waters. The solutions are out there and yet he mentioned none of that.
Watching this video is just going to waste every viewers' time.
but we do have the answers, karl marx already wrote the theory decades ago, we just can't put it into practice
@@giogio51592 Well, not that we can't, someone don't allow us do it.
@@liasonlee1248
because it didn't work.
inb4 "It's wasn't real communism"
@@ljuc didn't work, or someone spent trillions of dollars to stop it?
Short answer (not a summary of the video): yes, but we have been conditioned into a false dichotomy so we do not consider it; much of the modern culture must change before it can be possible.
I would love to see some indy games along the lines of civilization or sim city that explore different economic models. Most games have gold as a base resource, baking capitalism into the game from the start. Maybe simulations will enable us to make progress, and get used to thinking about what options we have post-capitalism.
There's a a bunch of Country Simulator Games like Democracy 4 and Victoria 3 where you can experiment with different economic and political systems already
@@akay_2 They aren't radical enough.
Gold and silver were used as medium of exchange before the advent of capitalism. And the production model used in the Civ games is really state planning: you, the player, decide what is produced and how to reinvest surplus.
Close i can think, is workers and resources, but for socialism
What does Gold have do to with capitalism?
That was very informative, Thank you
If government actually cared, it would tax all extraction and negative externalities instead of taxing sales and incomes. This would get us less of what we don't want and more of what we do want.
Wouldn't that just cause the price of everything that's made from those raw materials to be more expensive?
@@christianlewis7055 it also means they wouldn't be taxed for using what's already in the system (ex recycling) though im unsure if farming would count as extraction in this case (course it would also probably lower the amount of money being given to the government which would also be undesirable)
They tax incomes because of the debt they have to pay central banks and taxes the people is the easiest way Vs a big corp with lawyers
@@christianlewis7055 Yes, that's the incentive for change isn't it? If driving a mile was 10x the cost it is, people would quickly switch to public transit and also stop building houses 50km from the city centre.
The current government policies are just a way for people to subsidize their life by moving the actual costs to poorer nations, primarily through climate change and keeping the currency propped up.
I mean, economists might not be able to predict the future, but isn't a big chunk of the field about managing future risk? How can you even talk about growth without trying to predict the future?
what grows?
Yeah he is extremely wrong on this, if economics didn't predict anything it would be useless. Like weather forecasts there are too many variables involved to do accurate predictions on a bigger scope, but that doesn't mean it isn't the goal to make the predictions as good as possible.
(Note that I think this channel has pretty good and educational content, he is just wrong on this one)
@@joansparky4439 Human arrogance.
@@SpiceAndFox Ironically, economics is useless.
@@Mike-fx4nu no, that's always been infinite.
Thank you.
Two points:
1. I'd love to hear your thoughts on the donut model
2. Please do video covering the recent developments in AI
One of the fundamental problems in Economics is the failure to distinguish between needs and desires. This often results in a society where many individuals do not have their basic needs met.
That "just finished my morning coffee and Economics Explained called me mate" feeling
I propose a new economic model where you all give me your goods and services. In exchange for your goods and services you get nothing, which is beneficial to you because you don't have to worry about someone breaking in to your house to steal your stuff. Because you have no stuff nor a house. This will greatly decrease your stress. Additionally it removes money from the economy which cuts out market inefficiencies such as banks. This is of course very hard for me as I have to worry about you all stealing my stuff but that's a burden I am willing to carry for the good of society.
4:17 "things of value"
This is key. Value is a deeply personal, subjective and private matter. Zero scope for government intervention.
On a free market all those individual values trend towards the real cost of production.
Naturally unfree markets are much more profitable for the select few suppliers who are allowed to provide products and thus the value can never reach cost.
It's also why free markets trend towards ZERO profit for all parties involved.. only unfree markets can provide eternal profits.
@@joansparky4439 who creates "unfree markets"? Who gives or takes permits to allow or prohibit?
@@ricardokowalski1579 capitalist love unfree markets... That's one of the contradictions of capitalism. A system that's supposed to be innovative and dynamic will grind to a halt in the pursuit of profit because profit from the status quo can be a conflicting interest to innovation. Therefore capitalists will often bribe politicians in order to keep the status quo.
Side note: Your free market does a terrible job of incorporating negative value
@@WanderingExistence who creates "unfree markets"?
@@ricardokowalski1579 lol, capitalists, silly.
Very interesting video. I am no economist but I have an idea that could address the gap you mentioned about resources and demand that could solve the issues of social, wealth and the role of the government. Happy to chat.
I'm curious to learn what's your idea
Nice video 👍
But I would def have liked to see some evidence for the claim “better economic theories lead to higher standards of living”.
In other words, how are we sure we get the cause and effect the right way around?
I could totally see technological advancements leading to transformed economies and then economists studying and explaining this post hoc.
This would certainly be much more in line with how science mostly works.
As a physicist myself I’m probably biased and and am open to learn, so I’m looking for a genuine response ❤
Just look at Turkey to see how ignorance of the economic principles of interest rates and inflation can have a negative impact on people's lives.
This is true but does not address the question of whether A) economists first discover better systems which then get adopted or B) better technologies enable / unlock better economic systems which then get explained post hoc by economists
@@shuikuan USSR vs United States. Both plenty of natural resources and knowledge, but one system was more efficient than the other. Since they existed at the same time, we can say the technology was the same and held constant
It's like saying better physics theories lead to better star formation. Nonsense.
People are animals and they consume like animals until they destroy their ecosystem enough to cause their own collective apocalypse. Humans have the special ability to destroy ecosystems faster due to technology. Economics is a haughty, arrogant sector of a haughty, arrogant series of "disciplines" which aim to do nothing more than put navel-gazers into seats of power.
Economics is an attempt by wankers to avoid the basic facts that natural resources are finite and not every person is going to get fed tomorrow.
@@musicandoutdoors Was the US policy directed by economists and their theories or was the policy developed by politicians and afterwards economists explained the effects it had?
I think his question is what is the driving force? Do economist and their theories actually create or influence economies?
The story of how chips are made is fascinating and a real marvel. I think a lot of our technology is over stated, simpler principles than they would have us believe but making chips is really something.
I was half expecting EE to put rank Humanity on the economic leaderboard... kind of disappointed he didn't.
Howard Scott, along with M. King Hubbard, Thorstien Veblin, and several other technical professionals proposed a distribution system based not on barter, but on energy accounting.
I like the concept of logistic growth, I've heard it talked about a bit lately. It doesn't even seem incompatible with capitalism, it's a reshuffling of priorities based on finite resources. It almost seems inevitable.
The universe has 10000000 stars and you think it is finite. There is nothing more infinite than the galaxy
@@georgia2727 that's nice, we havent even managed to exploit resources on the moon though...
@@georgia2727 irrelevant to the logistics industry or the economy as a whole. With the time it takes to travel those distances anything past the asteroid belt is largely irrelevant to us even once things like extra terrestrial mining becomes viable.
Living near Seattle it's amazing to see what companies like Amazon have done. The difference between what logistics were like for shipping companies 30 years ago vs 20 years ago was night and day, then it changed a ton from 20 years ago to 10 years ago, and again in the last 10 years. Now we've got packages/deliveries that are monitored hour to hour, drivers have live dash cams and 24/7 tracking, everything feeds back to HQ, and we've got robots and machines moving things around in some large facilities. They're already starting to automate warehouses more and more so soon they'll resemble a giant vending machine with machines moving packages around automatically and we're already seeing some automated trucks moving stuff around facilities and ports.
Resources are limitless. Maybe go outside during night time and look up every now and then.
"Nobody can predict the future, least of all economists." ... no quote has ever contained more truth than this.
That was very informative. Thank you :)
Dankie!
Great content. Always leaves me wanting to know more about economics.
"prosperity comes from big gov spending and planned inflation" is the equiv. to "heal me by draining my blood"
Just a heads up, ASML makes (one of) the machines used by the fabs like TMSC. ASML’s machines are the most complex of those used to manufacture semiconductors, but they are just one among many advanced machines necessary. And the silicon wafers are just silicon (mostly). There is no mirror substrate. Zeiss might grow the silicon crystals that are sliced into wafers, but they are more of and optics company. They work in conjunction w/ ASML and focus on the optics, mirrors, and process. I’m getting into the weeds a bit, but the main takeaway is companies like TMSC are fabs. Companies like ASML and Zeiss make the machines used by fabs like TMSC, Samsung, and Intel.
Zeiss makes the 1 silicon atom thick mirrors for ASMLs EUV machines. I don't believe they make wafer ingots for chips.
Yea, when he started comparing economics to hard science and taking about the process of chip fabrication, I was having a real hard time taking anything else seriously
Perpetual growth monetary system on a finite planet.........what can go wrong 🙄
@BeerCanBennytheIVbut why they would do that? It's not profitable
I loved the part where he explained mechantilism, ohh they just exported more and imported less. Like we don't know what they were doing😂😂. They were carving up foreign land and using slavery to continue their endless growth and quench for profits
I think any economic system that's considered complete would need to survive something catastrophic, such as a mining company bringing back a thousand times our global economy in refined asteroid metals from space. A complete economic system would be boosted by such a delivery and result in more productive and computational power as a result, a modern global economy would face job-ending crashes and a loss of productivity across the globe for a time.
If that happens, we all go communist. There'd be no scarcity
I always find these propositions interesting. The price of platinum group metals is a function of supply and demand. I knew a 100 year old antiques dealer who could remember when aluminum and platinum opera glasses had the same cost as the process for processing aluminum cheaply had not been created yet. Once it had, aluminum plummeted. Platinum would face the same pricing pressure: if the supply were to double overnight, the price would crash. No amount of anything exists of greater value than the global economy because the per unit value would reflect the supply available.
@@es330td you only need to look at oil to see the problem with your assumption. The fact that a resource can be supplied does not mean those with control over it will supply it. The per unit value is artificially controllable, and is regularly controlled; it's only drastic changes in demand that can actually 'correct' commodities.
@@dudebros6122 Communism doesn't go against individualism and communist parties in Western countries are becoming more popular. Conservative parties are dying out
@@dudebros6122 It does not directly conflict with individualism. You're not very intelligent, are you?
Economics crosses into production, distribution, power hierarchies, physical sciences, and social sciences so... lots of room for disagreement especially when most issues are multi-factor but attributing the prime factors in a 'scientific' way assigns blame or credit- people get perturbed.
It's not so much about what we know of economics, it's what we understand.
Take for example Keynes/Hayek most economists would likely say that they argued their points, whereas I would suggest they refined each others points and both positions can be held consistently.
That deeper understanding of economics isn't something that's learnt through a course but is more integrated knowledge; just as Feynman used to ask his students about refraction and then what it actually means for when he holds a piece of glass up to the light and rotates it, for economics it's about understanding what impact the theories have on the real world and how they can be coherently integrated into good policy/etc.
How would you say we resolve this issue then?
@@alienesquemotivation use the scientific method and do a proper root cause analysis. Afaik no school of economic thought has done so (yet).
@@joansparky4439 I understand that, let me elaborate, it doesn't matter if do that, at the end of the day it needs implementation and I can guarantee no nation on planet earth is going to change how they operate just to test a theory. At most you'd be lucky to win the Nobel price. Which University will change what works for them.
Economics is not a natural science, what's factual in anglophone countries is completely out the window in other parts of the world
@@alienesquemotivation I'm not talking top down approach.
Hello there, a mixed used economy system works very well. Look at Germany, I would say that we are thriving.
It’s like when physicists were saying there wasn’t really much else to learn about the universe before Einstein drafted his theory of relativity
yeah, but this time we already have an answer to what economics are after capitalism
@@PeidosFTWplease remember people need food, if you're implying "that"
It really feels like economics is in the state now that physics was in when those who later went on to create quantum mechanics were told there's nothing left to be learned here - wer're just chasing some last digits of some numbers, and that's it.
Nope, because Newtonian mechanics had pretty good explanatory and predictive power. How many economists reliably make accurate forecasts?
@@WiggaMachiavelli Dear, you don't understand economics ! go follow a graduated micro and follow the perequesite. 1) Microeconomics theory = thought experiment where conclusion follow with mathematical demonstration from a set of assumption.
economy and capitalism is constantly evolving every day
I bet there is a way to model and test new economic systems using trained neural networks. Perhaps we don't have enough computing power currently to make the models realistic on a large scale though.
no it's not possible, economy is way too complex and it's a lot to do with human behavor that you can't really "model"
This guy is so humble. I love it!
i would genuinely love to hear your modern take on socialism..
Maybe a well informed debate and brainstorming of ideas between various proposed models?
Won't hear it from this guy, all you'll get is "socialism bad" and "communism is when no iphone"
not even saying the word in the video its pretty clear for this guy "Death is a preferable alternative to Communism."
There's nothing wrong with implementing a few socialist policies here and there, but people need to give up on seeing it as a replacement for capitalism.
@@SuperCrow02 I agree with being moderate is usually the best way forward
@@ehtresih9540 because they are
If an economic system has failed in literally every country it's tried than it is objectively bad
In the series Star Trek they have a post-scarcity economy where everyone has his basic needs met. As a viewer, I don't recall having heard their statements on post-scarcity, but someone collected half a dozen clips from Star Trek characters explaining their economy.
In many rich economies such as in the Skandinavien countries we are in a (more or less) post scarcity situation, large Welfare systems are established to ensure that nearly everyone has their basic needs taken care off (exept social and sexual needs).
@@leonfa259 definitely a stretch to refer to it as anything close to post scarcity.
@@leonfa259 How do you deal with housing?
@@leonfa259 Yes and we as a species is very close to achieve this in a global scale. We already produce more food than the world needs, we only need to find a cheap source(or storage method) of energy that doesn't destroy our environment and is renewable for the foreseeable future.
Here's how I think of it, basic needs met = basically nothing gets done. Sounds dystopian.
Recent studies have revealed that external motivation doesn't work. For example Grades in school. Grades make the focus less on learning for it's own sake and challenging one's self to trying to get the easiest classes to get better grades.
Similar to the video's topic. Grades may not accomplish the desired outcome, but it's the best we have so far. There have been numerous attempts to replace grading with something else, they didn't work. Grading is still the best that we've got, and I guess it's the same with external motivation.
There could be a way to test economies in a lab.
During my time at university I researched virtual economies like those in MMORPGs. The trick is: People behave pretty similar in a simulated world as in a real one. And we could induce economic shocks to economies with thousands of players to see what would happen.
I proposed these kinds of simluations to the European Central Bank. And while they found it fascinating, they told me they couldn‘t use these simulations. As I remember, they said that their economic models have to be deterministic (i.e. be repeatable and produce the same result).
I still think virtual economies could be a new and fascinating way to research new economic theories. Maybe even a way for some machine learning algorithms to experiment rapidly and learn to present us with a better economic theory. What do you think?
That was done already decades ago, you mind want to read for example the reports of the rome club, books like Limits to Growth, etc.
The problem is, it is hard to convince people who think that the earth is a squre that it actually has a round shape. Economy is a dynamic system, whose negative effects might be not noticeable right away due to the time delaying effects.
So, while you can create a model showing that the capitalist production system as it is now, is not sustainable in the long term, you can't tell exactly, when you will hit that point when it will fall apart. This is the reason why the work of Marx was made fun of 100 years ago, but now it is getting less and less "laughable" in economist circles. What he did was actually to describe the capitalist production system model with words, predict its long-term negative consequences, which we all are experiencing now, but he could not tell the exact time point, when that will happen.
@@nikolaizaicev9297 thanks. Yeah, my university time was decades ago 😆. But I’d be interested if n virtual economies in computer games to research economic theories - do you have any specific sources or keywords to search for?
@@RealWorldMusicTheory
Unfortunately, I do not know of any books for that.
I think you can just focus on the system dynamics books, there are many economic models that were build with that.
Also agent based and game theory based modelling is quite popular in the microeconomy field.
Just use google scholar and use the system dynamics + economy or agent modeling + economy keywords.
Makes me remember Fukuyama Talling the History was pretty much over (a few years before twin towers went down).
One important aspect always absent when you say that some people does some things better than others (the idea behind supply chain fever) is that no matter how well people do things, the system does not work in a way to cover the needs (even the Basic ones) of who actually does the things. Capitalists try their best to avoid doing so. Then it is fair to say that as much as economists can't predict the future, they can't say they work in a social science and tell a system that utterly does not even try to be the best for the Society as a whole is the best there is.
Hey! Can you make a video on Ecological Economics, that seems to question a lot of the basic assumptions of traditional economics such as the unlimited wants postulate.
Do you mean there wouldn't be someone who would always want a little more something or that the growth can't be infinite? I think that the universe is infinite and so there is no upper limit on the resources that can be used given enough time.
unlimited wants have a ceiling - it's called 'work one personally needs to do' to PRODUCE THE MEANS to satisfy those wants.
A day has got 24 hours, 12 hours are roughly available for spending time to produce the means to satisfy your own wants. THIS IS A HARD LIMIT.
The only way to get around this limit is by somehow "convincing" other people that they use THEIR time to produce means for YOUR wants and give them to you WITHOUT you giving them equivalent means back.. but this only works on unfree markets where involuntary exchanges happen.
@@akseli1111 the unlimited wants postulate is a postulate that makes sense in first glance, but research reveals that it may not be true. It kind of becomes a self fulfilling prophecy where it is forced down our throats.
In terms of actual human needs, they are both finite and satiable (further reading: max neef’s matrix of needs and satisfies). The “want” that classical economics portrays is just a small portion of an overall rich human experience. But it is not unlimited, rather it is a conditioned behavior stemming from a social structure that emphasizes material goods over non material welfare. A society that always produces will convince its citizens that they need the stuff that is produced (Say’s law: supply creates its own demand).
And that’s where ecological economics comes in and critically reevaluates the assumption that humans are insatiable and forms an economic system that moves away from unlimited growth.
Fantastic analogies! Concise descriptions then tying in to a point. Love it!
The answer is in the video and its not surprising the author said economists are terrible at it. Assigning a positive value to what economists see as a negative one is the answer.
We're trying it with Carbon but powerful vested interests thwart the idea before it people can see it would work.
Sometimes im amazed at how simplistic economists are, a scientific field never got anywhere without thinking outside the box.
A good place for alternatives to capitalism is the UA-cam channel called Unlearning Economics. It leans pretty far left, but the guy is a proper economist with a high standard for evidence. He talks about non-capitalist theories and practical was to implement them.
There is a economic system called a resource based economy advocated by the late Jacque Fresco and Roxanne Meadows.....it may be impossible to imagine but is not improbable practically since it takes positive aspect of current capitalism and transforms them into sustainable practices, furthermore eliminating negative market externalities
the guy didn't do a fully explainable process for that system to work, he just keeps saying technology this technology that, not explaining exactly the process behind for example, how making bread will work in a resource based economy
@@royalecrafts6252well neither did marx and tens of millions starved in china, as he would've liked. unclear instructions never stop people from trying!
He managed to draw the word "No" out over 14 minutes.
Sooo... the answer to your click bait is "I don't know????"
There is no better system than capitalism. For the ones who own the capital.
Video game economies are economies in a lab. You gave us a video about it, Eve Online.
@LTNetjak not to mention that games actively avoid trying to realistically simulate an economy because it would both be boring to the users and less profitable for the publishers.
However, Douglas's comment hints at the possibility of "laboratory conditions", create a simulation that does have as an objective to simulate the real mechanics of economics as precisely as possible and you have your lab, not to say that's easy, but I get the feeling modern AI work applied to a simulation framework capable of replicating economic models could be very useful.
Games, especially online games like EVE, are still great at providing insight into the effects and impacts of Incentives (and changes in them) in large communities of independent agents, see the "corrupted blood epidemic" case.
@@LTNetjak 1: But that rock will not mine itself. And carebears will tolerate a finite amount of pwnage.
2: same with LLC - a limited liability company. Even ponzi/fraud schemes, you do your time and repeat. Theranos - a 9Billion scam 11 years of prison time only.
@LTNetjak video games are probably more important than you think. or some of them are. you just need to understand the limitations. rocks repawn in eve but as long as you keep the amount of time limited to a certain length you can find useful information. death isn't permanent but we don't usually make day to day decisions with death as a consideration so you can rule it out. even in war soldiers lives aren't spent by someone risking their life - you won't find generals in the trenches. it'll only be a matter of time until someone makes a game where the economy is the game
A game economy, machine learned into being with terabytes of actual real-world historical economic data, could prove to be an interesting way to test some things out.
@@LTNetjakyou’re right but there’s not many better ways to experiment without doing it in a real environment. Simulations can give you a lot of data on a more realistic environment but it’ll always be affected by the biases of the scientist and it does lose a bit of the human chaos that’s so hard to simulate/study without actually involving real people. They’re often better than video games but they too are flawed and biased.
The reason they don't try different economic theories is because it's not profitable to do so, we have optimized profit seeking so well that there is no need to try a new system, if anything we might have to go back to older practices that seek profits better but are more easily seen by the people in the country profiting as immoral (i.e. child labor or slavery in the imperial core not just in the victimized countries)
Exactly everything is about making money off your labour, we are entirely post scarcity, except fuel(the only reason the us even involves itself in war unless they can sell people guns), which we should be working on getting rid of in exchange for renewable energy, we actually waste more food than we consume in the USA.
Great essay. It's also important to keep in mind that in modern scientific advances, it is usually the case that new theories provide a model that explains the exceptions in a way that elaborates on the old theory rather than casting it aside.
Rather than the transition from geocentrism to heliocentrism, I think a better analogy for what we may expect of future advances in economics is the transition from Newton Physics to relativity and quantum physics. Everything contained in Newtonian physics is still basically upheld for things that a working in what we consider normal conditions, but we now understand the exceptions and were able to develop a ton of new technology.
I see the basic ideas of capitalism and Keynesian macroeconomics as we have it today sticking around, with new advancements providing profound insight into where those models fall short. Then too, if we move the goalposts of what we want as a society, the present system would change a lot in response to that as well.
I love how you said "you may think you know where this is going, but you don't." And then I did. As someone that's very interested in chip manufacture, I was aware of Zeiss, ASML, TSMC etc quite a while ago.
I’m a bit surprised to hear you advance the argument that capitalism comes about as a result of the absence of government regulation rather than a product of government regulation of a certain type.
Markets of all kinds need government regulation to function. Where governments usually fail is either in their failure to regulate markets at all (vide the GFC) or, more often, trying to regulate price.
As he says making proper experiments in economics is almost impossible. Particularly determining the ideal controls. That's why "Social Sciences" cannot follow the scientific method (and I personally think that therefore should not be called a science). As a consequence progress in the field is slow. The example of a doctor not supposed to predict the future is used, but doctors are supposed to provide prognosis all the time, and they are usually correct. This is because we figured out how to apply the scientific method to medicine. Advances like the economic Nobel prizes of 2019 or 2021 makes me hopeful that soon a somewhat adapted scientific method may be applied to economics and we can finally call it a science
Experiments are not the only methods in science
How else do you think we learned about the human brain?
Freak accidents mostly, not a whole bunch of people doing random lobotamizations
@@ravanpee1325 In my mind it's a matter of definition. The scientific method is roughly: observation, hypothesis, experimentation, results, publication. If it's impossible to perform one or several of the steps, it's not Science. That does not mean that particular field cannot be studied, you just need to use a different method, not the scientific method. It just so happens that the scientific method is particularly good.
@@javierl2671 Experiment is of course not the only scientific methode. Also a phenome doesn't have to be explained by a monocausal explanation when there are many variables
07:31 - And it's possible that tomorrow some brilliant economist(s) will come up with a system that revolutionizes the way that we manage economies to such an extent that it'll be like entering the space age.
Jacque Fresco's resource based economy is a very interesting proposition.
Marxism updated to match recent fads like being eco-friendly?
I also support this approach, more then any other if it comes to shifting from our current to a new socioeconomic systems.
I however also have it in mind, that none of a systems can function in each times the best. Everything depends on the environment we live in, technology we have available, people able to contribute to the society, social laws, and the most important - resources. Every system can work if it's applied properly to the conditions people live in. I'm not sure if we're ready to shift towards RBE today, we would need to build a proper infrastructure first in the current system, but to me RBE seems to be the most efficient system invented to solve many issues we have that are rooted in how our current socioeconomic systems work.
Look up Henry George
The core idea is competition. It allows for ones that does the best to succeed while letting the less so fail. It is the most natural way to create improvements and growth. Until we reach a point where we don’t need fast improvements and growth, then competition is always necessary. Any system that causes there to be a lack of competition(monopoly) before we reach that point would be very counterproductive.
We face brand-new issues every day. It's the new typical. We initially believed there to be a catastrophe, but now we understand there is a new normal and we must adjust. How can we increase income throughout the quantitative adjustment process in 2023, which so far appears to be a year of great economic misery across the country? I can't afford for my $280,000 in savings to disappear.
I have bad news for you. Unless you are actively growing your money it is disappearing every day. This is due to the intentional devaluation of the currency by government money printing. It’s plain stealing, and I don’t know why we let them get away with it!
we don't need to increase income ,rather lower the prices. We are short of one good 2008 type recession
It did not work then, and it will not work now.
I have a sense that only the complete collapse of the capitalist system, and with it, the political system will free everyone.@@sten260
This is really sweet and optimistic, thanks for the video
"The economics profession is a cartel invented to defend error." - Thomas Frank
So?
@@neeljavia2965 So what?
or at least the status quo..... no one else is paying economists.....
@@carycunningham9510 That's not true.
@@neeljavia2965 How do you know?
Human economic systems just reflect the most fundamental laws that govern biological systems. At the core is how our own biological system works. With this I mean: our body accumulates fat, to cover times of hunger. The mind has a built in fear of dying, hence our drive to accumulate and create "security", much like Squirrels keep a stash of nuts for the winter.
We just have taken this to another level, were people collect art and yachts worth way more than you need to survive, but the driver is the same biological instinct, which in may opinion cannot be switched off. There are biological systems in nature that cooperate (ants, bees) but only to the extent were it serves the individual (so, some kind of "communism"), but that will never work 100% with humans, because we do have big differences individually. Some of us run faster, think faster, have a greater memory - either by nature or nurture - for some it is easier to learn a new language. That is why communism never worked and never will! (Why should the fastest Gazelle slow down to the pace of the sick and old? Why should someone that is smarter, more creative, make the same money as someone that has no such skills?).
Right now we don't even have pure capitalism (Profits are privatized and Losses are socialized - saving Banks or big Corps with Tax money), which is not right. Limited resources and human nature will probably always create a mix between capitalism and some form of socialism, mirroring what happens in nature.
To my (arguably rather small) knowledge, and while details can vary, the outlines are rather simple: Centralization vs individualism, this being a spectrum; IMHO, a working, well developed country would benefit more from increasing their welfare state and people-oriented, while a developing country basically has to be more "liberal" and be company-centric. Though, of course, both have to guarantee either has space to both grow and a place to stand (thats where the details come in)
So far, I know of no other system that works well enough. We might perhaps someday stumble upon one, but up until know, that is what we have; The aforementioned spectrum can head more towards socialism or more towards capitalism, but it would never be purely any of the two. And more extreme and outlier forms of govt are much more short lived and tend to rely on a far more oligarchic or even authoritarian
Maybe im wrong, Idk, but so far no one ever showed me something better
As for infinite growth.... Idk honestly. At the very least we should head towards automation and better quality of life regardless of the system, but I believe there are limits only curtailed by volatility/swings. I dont think its wise to have access to more resources than we have