ITT: People proving the OP right
Communism is not the redistribution of wealth, is a state of absolute wealth, where money no longer makes sense. Also, Socialism isn't taking your money, it gives you the money you deserve for your labor by destroying the class that steals it from you.
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There's also a reason why Venezuela was doing better than we were a while back.
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this post caused me physical pain. Might i ask what level of education you have? if you've ever taken an economics class you'd know that wages are derived from economic output, as well as supply and demand of labor. The reason someone makes minimum wage flipping burgers at mcdonalds is because everyone in america can do it, thus the supply of people able to flip burgers far outweighs the demand, pushing wages as low as possible. The CEO of mcdonald's contribution to the economy is so much bigger than one of his employees at the drive thru it's not even funny. Not to mention CEOs are bare none the smartest people in the world. so few people can be CEO's that the lack of supply drives up their wages. If a company doesn't pay their CEO enough he could just leave and go to another company. thats what every uneducated idiot in america doesn't understand. The system isn't broken, it works just fine. Middle class wages haven't risen in years because the cost of consumer goods has fallen so sharply. just look at the price of TVs if you don't know what i mean. Everyone in america acts like their victims when in reality they're just lazy spoiled assh()les. You dont make six figures unless you work harder and smarter than everyone else. CEOs who make millions a year spent every waking moment of their school career working harder than you to get into an ivy league school and run a business. America needs to wake the -blam!- up. This isn't little league baseball where you get a participation trophy for just showing up. Hardworking people don't owe you jack shit. My response to people who think welfare spending should be expanded is: Get off your ass and get a job.
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Your post caused me pain, use paragraphs. University education, and I am aware of the wage equation. If your comment is in response to 'money no longer makes sense.', then perhaps you failed to pay attention in econ. That scenario works in a post scarcity society, and only then. That is what I alluded to with 'absolute wealth'. As for Socialism, 'From each according to their ability, to each according to their contribution'. Obviously according to that axiom, those that don't contribute don't receive. However, unlike capitalism which uses unemployment to drive wage prices down, a proper socialist economy has 100% employment potential, as profit is not the motive. CEOs are very smart, however quite arrogant to assume that they are the smartest, and just because they may be excellent at producing profit, does not mean that they are contributing more than someone who makes much less.
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Actually my entire comment was in response to your line about classes stealing from one another, hence the single paragraph. Therefore your explanation of the fundamentals of socialism was entirely unnecessary. You seem to have misinterpreted what I was saying, which I can't say I blame you since my comment was pretty much one long rant. That aside, my point was that under capitalism, no class is "stealing" from another. I'm not sure now whether you used that term to more effectively describe the ideology behind socialism or if you actually believed that is the case in America. As for CEOs, perhaps I used some seriously broad language in describing my opinions about them, but the fact of the matter is that they are the best at their industry, putting them up there in the ranks of world renowned scientists and professors. As for their economic output, they are directly responsible for the production of any past, present, or future products. They may not be the ones on the assembly line, but at some point in any company's history, they were the ones who built the company from the ground up, and by that logic I think that they truly are contributing more than someone making less; although the specifics of which are not always quantifiable. I'll close with my personal view that turning America into a welfare state will be the biggest mistake in our country's history. They say you shouldn't feed wild animals because they will become dependent on you and unable to fend for themselves. This applies directly to the issue of social security. While I acknowledge that it's morally questionable to compare the poor to wild animals, my morality resides in the reasoning that there simply isn't enough money to sustain the current path of handouts and social benefits. The collapse of such a system years down the road would almost certainly be akin to the conditions in Greece right now, with riots and anarchy in the streets over austerity measures put in place to keep the country from going under. I suppose my point is that people will always demand more no matter how much you give them. It's a slippery slope, and while we can probably afford to increase social security in the short run, it spells disaster for everyone in the long run.
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Under a marxist viewpoint, capitalists (those who own the means of production) do steal the labor of the workers, because the value of their labor is (substantially) more than what they are paid. Because of this, the main point of socialism is to remove the capitalists from the equation, workers own the means of production. This can take many forms from state socialists (where the state, directly democratic, controls the means, and by extension the workers) to Anarchosocialism/Mutualists (workers form local cooperatives, etc...). In an actual socialist system, there would be no undeserved handouts as everyone who wanted a job would have one (since there is no reason to maintain an army of unemployed), and one that paid appropriately. Of course when you are no longer able to work and retire, you would should receive a pension to maintain a quality standard of living. As for Greece, reckless spending was part of it (like the '04 Olympics), but they also had depressed revenue from tax evasion that escalated the problem. Also, Greece manipulated it's figures in order to get into the EU. Social Security is a sustainable system so long as tax revenue is stable enough. SS had only a small deficit projected for the Baby Boomer retirement phase until the recession hit and tax revenue dropped. For social security to be strong again, the workers need to be economically stable and the capitalists cannot consolidate wealth as they have been. Medicare, despite costing less per action that many insurance plans, has a deficit because of exorbitant medical costs, Part D is especially notable, as the program is not allowed to negotiated prices.
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[quote]If your comment is in response to 'money no longer makes sense.', then perhaps you failed to pay attention in econ. That scenario works in a post scarcity society, and only then.[/quote]And a "post scarcity society" is something that will never, ever exist, unless we figure out how to break the laws of nature and synthesise matter from nothing.
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Not in the literal sense, but in the sense that resources are so abundant that they are virtually free. Coupled with advanced automation which all but eliminates the [u]need[/u] to work. This is where communism can exist. It is possible to obtain, without breaking the laws of physics. Take energy, when nuclear fusion reactors become commonplace, the price of energy should drop substantially. Over the long term, necessities of life can be so abundant that we can provide and distribute enough for everyone.