To a large extent yes, but they are also quite quickly put under sanctions by powers with economical interests in the specific country. Just look around South America, it's happened on a regular basis.
“Socialism” vs. “Capitalism” debate
- Thread starter Kinsella
- Start date
Assuming that we operate with a Capitalistic ----------Socialistic continium here:
Neither are perfect and as always should never be done to the extreme.
However, capitalism(or some elements of it) would suit a developing economy (assuming no foreign interference aka developed countries and its big corporation effing up developing African economies and markets) in theory since this is what is likely to create jobs and create a middle class.
In a developed economy like in most "western" Countries, a more socialistic (compared to the US as a reference) model of governance would be more beneficial due to its emphasis to distribute wealth and keep having a prominent middle class.
Neither are perfect and as always should never be done to the extreme.
However, capitalism(or some elements of it) would suit a developing economy (assuming no foreign interference aka developed countries and its big corporation effing up developing African economies and markets) in theory since this is what is likely to create jobs and create a middle class.
In a developed economy like in most "western" Countries, a more socialistic (compared to the US as a reference) model of governance would be more beneficial due to its emphasis to distribute wealth and keep having a prominent middle class.
I'm not saying government can't innovate. I'm saying they can't innovate efficiently.
Of course if Boris threw £500b into solar technology over this Parliament we'd see world leading innovation; however it would be inefficient, expensive and incorrectly/poorly focused.
A private company could not reach the moon before NASA because it would have had zero incentive to do so. Now that there are financial incentives for space shuttle innovation you can guarantee the private sector will be advancing these efficiently in line with market appetite.
Innovation is part of human nature because innovation has always been tied to incentives. People innovate to improve their lives and capitalism is the vehicle to achieving that improvement.
You should read up about the history of Darpa and the role of the US military in silicon valley. It's not as simple as you claim.
Sometimes efficiency isn't what's being required. True invention often requires waste. The Manhatten Project, or ITER, or Apollo, because only governments can bring sufficient resources to bear in a short enough timescale.
In order:
That’s some libertarian propaganda you bought into. You can’t seriously believe every innovation is done inefficiently. Have you looked into every innovation and researched how efficiently it has been done? Do you even have a standard or some kind of metric of what constitutes efficient? You have to expand your observations beyond of only the cases that went wrong or inefficiently. I’m an under 65 Medicare patient here. And I also had multiple different private insurance plans.Guess which has been a more efficient experience for me when it comes to my healthcare. Hint: the government one.
Well you’re proving my point. NASA went and did it and laid the foundations for private enterprise to even attempt space exploration. Think of the thousands of hours of research by the best scientists and engineers in the world to develop some of the most efficiently ran technology to conduct space exploration. And guess what, all these private space companies still have to work closely with NASA.
Yes, incentives. Incentives can be anything. Money is but one of them. You think when ancient Egyptians were innovating whatever the hell they were innovating thousands of years ago were doing it to make money? You think the incredible amount of Soviet innovations were done for money? You think Nikola Tesla and Einstein were innovating to be filthy rich? Are you aware of the innovations made by government-grant researchers who aren’t doing it for a payday? Come on man, acknowledge some context to what you’re saying.
Remember the airline that killed the lower league Brazilian football club? Remember how they cut many corners to save money and fecked everything up? Oh how efficient they were! Capitalism such efficient!
It’s as if not having a profit motive can lead to some of the most important pieces of technologies that capitalists can use for free to innovate something and get rich from and then do as much as possible to avoid paying taxes back to the government that paved the foundation that led to their innovations in the first place.
Efficiency isn’t the end-all, be-all that some people make it out to be...
(Long read warning)
https://hbr.org/2019/01/rethinking-efficiency
(Review of the previous long article)
https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/efficiency-is-enemy-of-innovation.html
While some efficiency is good, what we have seen in the real quest for efficiency has been a system that has lead to conglomeration and the destruction of start up competitors. It has also stifled innovation, reduced entrepreneurship, led to corporate welfare, structural fragility in large sectors of the economy, and social unrest. Resilience in the economy should be what is sought, rather than efficiency just for the sake of it.
(Long read warning)
https://hbr.org/2019/01/rethinking-efficiency
(Review of the previous long article)
https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/efficiency-is-enemy-of-innovation.html
While some efficiency is good, what we have seen in the real quest for efficiency has been a system that has lead to conglomeration and the destruction of start up competitors. It has also stifled innovation, reduced entrepreneurship, led to corporate welfare, structural fragility in large sectors of the economy, and social unrest. Resilience in the economy should be what is sought, rather than efficiency just for the sake of it.
Capitalism has its flaws of course but youd have plenty more airplanes crashing under a socialist setup. You wouldnt attract the best engineers to build the best planes and end up with crap sub standard machines.
Also I like how some of you are casually negating efficiency. That's all privileged talk. Inefficient systems end up being a massive burden on the lower and middle class with rations depleting and groceries becoming a luxury.
But my main point is flaws in capitalism does not mean pure socialism is any better.
Yeah that explains how the Soviets accomplished all the space exploration milestones before the US did, minus the moon landing.
Btw, that groceries becoming a luxury bit (seems to reference USSR) only occurred during the far latter stages of the Soviet era where they started introducing more capitalist measures and weren't even a real socialist nation at that point. Most of their existence, things like groceries and common items were in plenty stock and European imports were available with the only downside being that fashion was a tad behind. This is what I learned from former Soviet residents from the 60s and 70s. If I can find the reddit again, I'll post it here.
I think Aeroflot was renown for crashing a lot though? That's more relevant than space exploits.
I'm going off articles like this: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/...iest-airline-to-one-of-the-safest-in-the-sky/
I'm assuming you're from the US from your user name. The US healthcare system is an awful model to use when discussing the efficiencies of private health as it's rife with collusion and corruption between lobbyists and government. The US system though is an example of private sector innovation since the majority of innovation in this sector comes from the US companies that pass on that cost to the US citizen. In this sense the US population is getting shafted because they are footing the bill for innovation with Western nations either benefiting without paying the full cost or not offering the drug at all if it's too expensive. The former is good for the UK in the short term but bad for long term innovation, the latter is bad for UK consumers as they're not having access to the best products.
Again I don't disagree that government innovate. The question I'd ask though is whether their innovation is a) wanted by the populace or b) value for money.
https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2010/feb/01/nasa-budgets-us-spending-space-travel
According to the above over the last 60 years NASA have operated they've had an average budget of 1.1% of US budget on space travel. Working on the last budget specified of $4.4T that's the equivalent of spending $48b per annum for 60 years... A equivalent spend of nearly 3 trillion dollars or $23,000 for every single US family. I think it would be hard for anyone to justify that this spend is either a) an efficient use of funds b) a spend that was in the best interests of the US taxpayer and c) was value for money.
I also didn't say that money is the only incentive, however in the modern world it's by far the largest and most incentive. You mention ancient civilisations and of course other incentives superseded finance, for example survival. In the modern world though these same incentives aren't as relevant.
I don't disagree that throwing insane amounts of finance in a short period of time will produce innovation, that's obvious. My point is it isn't efficient innovation. Are there certain circumstances where inefficient but quick innovation is a must? Possibly although I can't think of one off the top of my head. Creating a weapon that can wipe out civilisation or a vanity program to walk on the Moon certainly wouldn't pass that threshold.
Finally I'm not saying that capitalism is perfect, or that it can manage every sector regulation free. However it's by far the best system we have and from everything I've read well regulated capitalism is better than the governmental socialist alternative in the vast majority of sectors (including Health, Education and Transport, albeit not in Defence, Public Order, Justice System).
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Look at the actual numbers though.
So, Aeroflot had roughly five times as many deaths as Pan Am which was obviously from the decidedly capitalist United States. However.
By the mid-sixties Areoflot was apparently carrying way over five times as many passengers as Pan Am did in 1970! In that context, the two airlines' safety records don't seem that different: you had a similar chance of dying on a Pan Am flight as on an Aeroflot one.
I have no reason to doubt what the rest of the article says about the general reliability of Russian aircraft but clearly, the economic system that an airline operates in is not a clear predictor of the airline's safety record.
Pan Am did have Libyans blowing up their planes though.
Why is it plural?
I was thinking about the events below, but one was a hijacking and the other wasn't Pan Am so yes, not strictly true.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_Am_Flight_73#Libyan_involvement_and_legal_action
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UTA_Flight_772
You mean completely untrue.
Haha, ok sir.
That was a bit much, sorry.
But your link about Aeroflot struck my curiosity, if you are interested here you have the list of accidents and the causes.
Since Mr Curtis has been mentioned already this is worth posting(The whole thing is worth a read)
Adam Curtis - HE'S BEHIND YOU
https://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/f77519ae-1ab6-3755-8416-f18d1be078bc
Sorry for delay in responding. But the labor market for specialized professions would basically always have 1 firm as the sole demand for labor, which is a monopolistic market situation which is generally avoided in our current reality or offset by unionization. So the determining of wages probably wouldn't follow a true market logic or the state firms would just set wages really low.
Just realistically the wages would pretty much always be set by political decision rather than a market one. When you take away markets that have multiple participants on both demand and supply side you lose price discovery, so you lose your reference as to what the prices and wages should even balance out at. That's the entire challenge that the Soviet Union went through, trying to use mathematics and computing to figure out how much of each final and intermediary good should be produced and what the input costs should be which includes worker's wages.
Subtracting those 270 deaths makes it slightly better for Pan Am but doesn't negate the overall point.
Do you think Soviet planes only ever crashed due to mechanical error?
I shouldn't but this one made me chuckle because I'm not actually sure why they mentioned the drinking.
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I"m a weirdo who watches plane crash investigation videos a lot. There have been bad American, European, and Soviet designs. And there have been excellent ones too. What matters more than anything else is the time they were produced.
For example, from the 50s/60s, the TU-104, B707, DC8, deH Comet, all had appaling crash rates. Planes built in the 80s, like the Il-96, B777, A340, all have excellent records. WIthin each group some are better than others. I thik overall airspace was maybe less safe than American, but not by the massive margin that article implies. Not just did Aeroflot have more passengers, it performed missions commercial airlines in the west don't touch:
For example, from the 50s/60s, the TU-104, B707, DC8, deH Comet, all had appaling crash rates. Planes built in the 80s, like the Il-96, B777, A340, all have excellent records. WIthin each group some are better than others. I thik overall airspace was maybe less safe than American, but not by the massive margin that article implies. Not just did Aeroflot have more passengers, it performed missions commercial airlines in the west don't touch:
Reminded me that one of the most unique Soviet fighters needed vodka as a coolant - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Mikoyan-Gurevich_MiG-25#Design_description
(heard it elsewhere, cant find the source and that is what google gave me)
I just had a read, very interesting and thanks for sharing. I imagine it will be impossible to ever know for sure who carried out the attack. A few years back I went to a talk by the BBC journalist James Robins, who has interviewed all of the dictators of the 20th century. He said that Gaddafi was by far the worst, so I think that characterisation of him as a pantomime figure isn't capturing the whole truth.
1) Soviet planes have been pretty garbage compared to others especially fighter planes from latter decades of communism
2) There's a reason people from USSR have moved to capitalism economy countries and never the other way round.
Why post something from reddit? We can all find extreme views. Pro U.S, anti U.S pro China and so on.
Do you envision the CAF existing without capitalism?
Soviets had their fair share of epic failures too. One reason you could argue that space exploration was more advanced was because of its relation to the military which the Soviets prioritized. The point is that government-ran =/= more inefficient than privately ran as was originally asserted.
Read the ongoing discussion about Aeroflot.
You may want to research on the actual reasons for moving, from which state they’re moving from, and which time period. If it’s the late 80s for example, well there’d be a good reason to move as the country was practically bankrupt by then. It’s not like people said “capitalism is the best, let’s move to a capitalist nation”. People emigrate from capitalist nations all the time too.
The reference to reddit has nothing to do with extremist points of view so I don’t know where you got that from other than inventing it in your head as you typically do. These anecdotal accounts were completely objective as far as I can tell.
based on this, avoid the Il-18 at all costs.
basically very dependent on aircraft type. like other pioneering jet planes, the tu-104 was bad. the tu-124, 134, and 154 were ok, a lot of crashes but they were also used a lot and in difficult conditions. the tu-114, il-62, 86 and 96 were great, better records than western planes from the same time.
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It’s a valid point when critiquing the state socialism model. Market socialism operates differently and more like a free market but with the profit motive removed and public ownership of ownership of equity
And by profit motive, I mean it in the sense of not concentrating ownership and wealth at the top, which can arguably distort the markets.
I don't really know what to make of it and the link that we could find with socialism but between the 50s and 70s drinking, weather and crop-spraying seem to be regular conditions of crashes and accidents.
I know of Germans whose parents/grand parents feel life was better in the East. I think it largely comes down to how much you value security over opportunity.
There's a program on Norwegian TV these days about how Norway became the best country in the world to live in according to a bunch of rankings. It's a very interesting watch, mainly because of all the statistics comparing different countries around the world. The latest episode was probably the most interesting one so far, as it asked the question: if the leaders of many countries around the world know about this success story and have a genuine interest in creating something similar, then how come it's not happening? Essentially it boils down to 3 things:
1. The people of Norway generally trust that their politicians aren't corrupt and will put all the tax money into good use. No country scores higher in government trust(70%).
2. The people of Norway trust that their fellow Norwegians don't exploit the system and generally are willing to do what's right. No country scores higher in trust of their fellow man(nearly 80%)
3. Everyone, rich and poor alike, benefits from the system at the end of day. So it's not really a system of people being "nice". The richest 20% pay a little more taxes than in other countries, but they also get most of the same benefits as the poorest 20%(things like free education etc). It's also worth keeping in mind that Norway is near the very top when it comes to social mobility, so a lot of the people in the top 20% can easily sympathize with the poorest 20%, as many of them used to be down there themselves. But more importantly: the difference between rich a poor is much smaller in Norway. In the US a doctor earns about 8 times as much as a cashier. In Norway? About 2.5 times more.
The episode ended on a cliffhanger. This system is gradually being threatened, and the culprit seems to be the very rich(top 1%) and the ever growing number of poor people. This contrast has started to cause unrest and if we don't do something about it, we could end up tearing apart the system that was meticulously created.
1. The people of Norway generally trust that their politicians aren't corrupt and will put all the tax money into good use. No country scores higher in government trust(70%).
2. The people of Norway trust that their fellow Norwegians don't exploit the system and generally are willing to do what's right. No country scores higher in trust of their fellow man(nearly 80%)
3. Everyone, rich and poor alike, benefits from the system at the end of day. So it's not really a system of people being "nice". The richest 20% pay a little more taxes than in other countries, but they also get most of the same benefits as the poorest 20%(things like free education etc). It's also worth keeping in mind that Norway is near the very top when it comes to social mobility, so a lot of the people in the top 20% can easily sympathize with the poorest 20%, as many of them used to be down there themselves. But more importantly: the difference between rich a poor is much smaller in Norway. In the US a doctor earns about 8 times as much as a cashier. In Norway? About 2.5 times more.
The episode ended on a cliffhanger. This system is gradually being threatened, and the culprit seems to be the very rich(top 1%) and the ever growing number of poor people. This contrast has started to cause unrest and if we don't do something about it, we could end up tearing apart the system that was meticulously created.
Pulverized ownership companies are still profit seeking.
I admire Norway and know that it is a generally very well run country, probably as well as any other. But you can't talk about Norway's status as a #1 in rankings without also noting the fact that it has a relatively small population and large oil reserves. If I were to hypothetically take those oil fields from Norway and give them to Finland, Denmark, the Netherlands, Switzerland, or any other of the small and well run western European countries I believe any of those could take the places that Norway currently occupies in several development rankings.
In an earlier episode they brought up the oil and how it is being given way too much credit. Also, countries like Denmark, Sweden and Finland are doing almost as well as Norway(better in some respects). It's because they have a very similar model.
I see the "population size" argument thrown around a lot, but I've never really understood how it's relevant? More people also means more tax money. More tax money allows the government to implement all the benefits of the Nordic model. Am I missing something?