Time for a status update on cultural drift. I’ve been pondering solutions, and now see at best only three weakly promising options. The other possible approaches seem to me at best only modest supplements to these three best solutions.
Re. "We could change bequest and charity laws to let organizations that pay low tax rates primarily hold assets and reinvest their returns. If allowed to persist for generations, such orgs would accumulate most of the world’s capital." -- In the US, charitable foundations spend over $100 billion per year. I surveyed the top 10 US charitable foundations a couple of years ago, and 9 of them had been captured by woke boards, and spent most of their money on projects which excluded white males as beneficiaries. They were good causes, but very much aimed abroad rather than at the US, which is not what you want if your goal is to make the US adaptive.
Far-left organizations, including BLM in its early days, are mostly funded by far-left charitable money-laundering organizations, which accept money from the big foundations, then give it out to causes too radical and violent to be associated with the big foundations. Woke "grass-roots" activism today might not exist without these foundations and George Soros.
Charitable foundations left by billionaires are problematic bcoz billionaires trust accredited high-status people, meaning Ivy-league professors. The Big 3 mutual fund holders, BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street, all force far-left policies onto the companies they control through their $31 TRILLION in other people's assets. They allegedly follow the guidelines in the 2020 Davos manifesto: "companies should pay their fair share of taxes, show zero tolerance for corruption, uphold human rights throughout their global supply chains, and advocate for a competitive playing field." (https://www.govenda.com/blog/the-shift-to-stakeholder-primacy) But in fact they do none of these things. They focus on climate change, DEI, and governance rules which encourage companies to put more ivy league professors on their boards.
All big institutions constitute big targets for ideological takeover. Almost all such big private institutions have at present been taken over by the far left. The financial power of the far left appears to about 3 orders of magnitude greater than that of conservatives and liberals combined as a result. So be careful what you ask for.
You could deal with this by allowing the founder of the institution to place real restrictions on how it's spent. Ex. Henry Ford would hate what the Ford Foundation has become. If he had some ability to set the bylaws of the org in an enduring way, probably things would turn out differently
Much, if not most, of the problems we have today are not due to the lack of reining in those who are successful. The primary problem is not holding people accountable for their failures. Look at all the fraud perpetuated through government. Not one of the leaders will be held accountable. Or look at any of the many “well-intentioned” government programs that have created more harm, welfare, DEI.
As Thomas Sowell said, “"It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong".
Capitalism works wonders precisely because those who make poor decisions pay the consequences. Capitalism fails when decision makers are not personally held accountable.
Yes I find the more capitalism solution the most plausible and interesting one you've presented.
Long term investment orgs are particularly interesting - I like to think that allowing this type of thing would not just change rates of return and interest in the future but also induce more cultural variation through creating familial or dynastic orgs that grow in wealth and power over time and plausibly diverge at least a bit from the global monoculture.
Re. "Yes, many other parts of our world, such as marriage, parenting, sex, friendship, and art, are mostly “voluntary”, but that’s not “capitalism” for my purposes here." :
It's very bad to open with that. It sounds like you want people pay for brides or grooms, buy their friends, and pay for all sex. Like you want to require people to get a receipt for love and friendship. That isn't even what you want. Please stop presenting such an easy target. So many of your posts sound like you're begging to be attacked. Your actual proposals are radical enough.
I would like art to be "capitalist" in the sense that the public should be able to vote on eg the architecture of monuments and public buildings, and on publicly-funded art, including the playlist of publicly-funded orchestras. This because we've had 100 years of modernist crap paid for by the public. But most art IS mostly capitalist, eg novels, paintings, home decor. It could be a lot more capitalist if we used the Internet to eliminate the middle-men, such as publishing houses.
I don't normally chime in here... but when i do it's because it's important.
1. & 2. Jiddu Krishnamurti taught that belief is a profound barrier to understanding truth because it acts as a mental limitation, projecting known comforts (security, hope, fear) onto the unknown. Belief is a self-centered, conditioned response that prevents direct perception of reality, which can only be understood when the mind is silent and free from the known. Dogma are the brakes on this vehicle we call Mankind.
3. Capitalism is driven by the market (which is easy to manipulate) but directed by the crapitalists advancing their agenda and I think they've proven (beyond any doubt) they don't align with
what is best for society (forever wars, depopulation, good ideas squashed from view-think all the patents the govt. is hiding from You!) "You need us" is their mantra over and over again. "How else would anything ever get done?" "How are we supposed to redistribute the wealth?"First off, you make government free, no charge, gratis it's operations don't cost it's citizens one dime, nada zilch zippo nil.
Government is funded by taxing corporations, that's it that's all.
"2020 Specifics: Many corporations paid $0 in federal income taxes on 2020 profits, with 55 of the largest profitable corporations paying no corporate tax." -giggle.
Thank you
\
(unless i totally missed the mark here in which case, in the words of Emily Litella : nevermind;-)
Start with number 3 and go from there. They had something going on in Spain which G Orwell wrote of-a his 1st banned book btw, u.s. gov did not want people reading it- before they were slaughtered by govt. soldiers, Barcelona it was, 1930s. Start by taxing corporations the top 55 corps paid no tax in 2020. Zero How much do you think that amount would have been, enough to fund a SMALL government including a small military considering we have bombs bought and paid for that can do the work of hundreds of "boots on the ground" soldiers. Anyhoo
Not sure why you emphasize "Capitalist ≠ Voluntary" in your title, tho. Your proposals seem to be about changing law and goverment (which are by definition mostly non-voluntary) to use different non-voluntary rules.
You want capitalist-type incentives to work in more areas of life. You're not in principle changing the amount of coercion involved (tho some of your proposals are basically to allow things that aren't currently allowed), but to redesign existing coercive systems into more functional shapes.
Voluntary exchange and other forms of interaction is the only right behavior for humans. The future, she is uncertain, which is why voluntary exchange is the only reasonable answer.
No, actually, I was responding to you post, which I did read. Your post suggested possibilities other than voluntary exchange. Perhaps I misunderstood. I was reding rather quickly.
Re. "We could change bequest and charity laws to let organizations that pay low tax rates primarily hold assets and reinvest their returns. If allowed to persist for generations, such orgs would accumulate most of the world’s capital." -- In the US, charitable foundations spend over $100 billion per year. I surveyed the top 10 US charitable foundations a couple of years ago, and 9 of them had been captured by woke boards, and spent most of their money on projects which excluded white males as beneficiaries. They were good causes, but very much aimed abroad rather than at the US, which is not what you want if your goal is to make the US adaptive.
Far-left organizations, including BLM in its early days, are mostly funded by far-left charitable money-laundering organizations, which accept money from the big foundations, then give it out to causes too radical and violent to be associated with the big foundations. Woke "grass-roots" activism today might not exist without these foundations and George Soros.
Charitable foundations left by billionaires are problematic bcoz billionaires trust accredited high-status people, meaning Ivy-league professors. The Big 3 mutual fund holders, BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street, all force far-left policies onto the companies they control through their $31 TRILLION in other people's assets. They allegedly follow the guidelines in the 2020 Davos manifesto: "companies should pay their fair share of taxes, show zero tolerance for corruption, uphold human rights throughout their global supply chains, and advocate for a competitive playing field." (https://www.govenda.com/blog/the-shift-to-stakeholder-primacy) But in fact they do none of these things. They focus on climate change, DEI, and governance rules which encourage companies to put more ivy league professors on their boards.
All big institutions constitute big targets for ideological takeover. Almost all such big private institutions have at present been taken over by the far left. The financial power of the far left appears to about 3 orders of magnitude greater than that of conservatives and liberals combined as a result. So be careful what you ask for.
I'm talking about orgs that primarily reinvest their assets, and don't spend much.
You could deal with this by allowing the founder of the institution to place real restrictions on how it's spent. Ex. Henry Ford would hate what the Ford Foundation has become. If he had some ability to set the bylaws of the org in an enduring way, probably things would turn out differently
Much, if not most, of the problems we have today are not due to the lack of reining in those who are successful. The primary problem is not holding people accountable for their failures. Look at all the fraud perpetuated through government. Not one of the leaders will be held accountable. Or look at any of the many “well-intentioned” government programs that have created more harm, welfare, DEI.
As Thomas Sowell said, “"It is hard to imagine a more stupid or more dangerous way of making decisions than by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no price for being wrong".
Capitalism works wonders precisely because those who make poor decisions pay the consequences. Capitalism fails when decision makers are not personally held accountable.
Yes I find the more capitalism solution the most plausible and interesting one you've presented.
Long term investment orgs are particularly interesting - I like to think that allowing this type of thing would not just change rates of return and interest in the future but also induce more cultural variation through creating familial or dynastic orgs that grow in wealth and power over time and plausibly diverge at least a bit from the global monoculture.
Re. "Yes, many other parts of our world, such as marriage, parenting, sex, friendship, and art, are mostly “voluntary”, but that’s not “capitalism” for my purposes here." :
It's very bad to open with that. It sounds like you want people pay for brides or grooms, buy their friends, and pay for all sex. Like you want to require people to get a receipt for love and friendship. That isn't even what you want. Please stop presenting such an easy target. So many of your posts sound like you're begging to be attacked. Your actual proposals are radical enough.
I would like art to be "capitalist" in the sense that the public should be able to vote on eg the architecture of monuments and public buildings, and on publicly-funded art, including the playlist of publicly-funded orchestras. This because we've had 100 years of modernist crap paid for by the public. But most art IS mostly capitalist, eg novels, paintings, home decor. It could be a lot more capitalist if we used the Internet to eliminate the middle-men, such as publishing houses.
I don't normally chime in here... but when i do it's because it's important.
1. & 2. Jiddu Krishnamurti taught that belief is a profound barrier to understanding truth because it acts as a mental limitation, projecting known comforts (security, hope, fear) onto the unknown. Belief is a self-centered, conditioned response that prevents direct perception of reality, which can only be understood when the mind is silent and free from the known. Dogma are the brakes on this vehicle we call Mankind.
3. Capitalism is driven by the market (which is easy to manipulate) but directed by the crapitalists advancing their agenda and I think they've proven (beyond any doubt) they don't align with
what is best for society (forever wars, depopulation, good ideas squashed from view-think all the patents the govt. is hiding from You!) "You need us" is their mantra over and over again. "How else would anything ever get done?" "How are we supposed to redistribute the wealth?"First off, you make government free, no charge, gratis it's operations don't cost it's citizens one dime, nada zilch zippo nil.
Government is funded by taxing corporations, that's it that's all.
"2020 Specifics: Many corporations paid $0 in federal income taxes on 2020 profits, with 55 of the largest profitable corporations paying no corporate tax." -giggle.
Thank you
\
(unless i totally missed the mark here in which case, in the words of Emily Litella : nevermind;-)
So what type of solution do you suggest?
Start with number 3 and go from there. They had something going on in Spain which G Orwell wrote of-a his 1st banned book btw, u.s. gov did not want people reading it- before they were slaughtered by govt. soldiers, Barcelona it was, 1930s. Start by taxing corporations the top 55 corps paid no tax in 2020. Zero How much do you think that amount would have been, enough to fund a SMALL government including a small military considering we have bombs bought and paid for that can do the work of hundreds of "boots on the ground" soldiers. Anyhoo
The tricky part is getting from point A to point B. A=now, B=where you want to be
nobody wants to pay that price. and i don't blame them.
Since belief is a profound barrier to understanding truth, I obviously shouldn't believe you.
Exactly! (Sst fails to register when i click 'like' on comment;-)
...yes. This may be the best path forward.
Not sure why you emphasize "Capitalist ≠ Voluntary" in your title, tho. Your proposals seem to be about changing law and goverment (which are by definition mostly non-voluntary) to use different non-voluntary rules.
You want capitalist-type incentives to work in more areas of life. You're not in principle changing the amount of coercion involved (tho some of your proposals are basically to allow things that aren't currently allowed), but to redesign existing coercive systems into more functional shapes.
Voluntary exchange and other forms of interaction is the only right behavior for humans. The future, she is uncertain, which is why voluntary exchange is the only reasonable answer.
Do you not see capitalism as voluntary?
Of course I do. I wrote a book about it. I’m saying I rule out everything else.
So you weren't responding to my post, its just that seeing the word "voluntary" inspired you to comment "yay voluntary"?
No, actually, I was responding to you post, which I did read. Your post suggested possibilities other than voluntary exchange. Perhaps I misunderstood. I was reding rather quickly.