Capitalism Hinders Innovation

[Dans La Lune]

How would a more socialist mixed economy change industrialism so that it doesn't further degrade what's left of Earth's ecosystems?

It's a heavy lift to assign the burden of repairing the climate to an economic ideology that isn't remotely close to being implemented (after capitalism has utterly decimated it). However, we can start with the objectives of the Green New Deal (by the way, not a socialist concept):

• Providing investments and leveraging funding to help communities affected by climate change
• Repairing and upgrading existing infrastructure to withstand extreme weather and ensuring all bills related to infrastructure in Congress address climate change
• Investing in renewable power sources
• Investing in manufacturing and industry to spur growth in the use of clean energy
• Building or upgrading to energy-efficient, distributed, and smart power grids that provide affordable electricity
• Upgrading all existing buildings and building new ones so that they achieve maximum energy efficiency, water efficiency, safety, affordability, comfort, and durability.
• Supporting family farming, investing in sustainable farming, and building a more sustainable and equitable food system
• Investing in transportation systems, namely zero-emission vehicle infrastructure and manufacturing, public transit, and high-speed rail
• Restoring ecosystems through land preservation, afforestation, and science-based projects
• Cleaning up existing hazardous waste and abandoned sites
• Identifying unknown sources of pollution and emissions
• Working with the international community on solutions and helping them achieve Green New Deals

These all exist within the capitalist frame work and are very achievable.

 

[NatMorton]

The incentive structure of capitalism requires that all innovation be profit-driven, rather than aimed producing the most effective, most efficient, or best product. In healthcare, it means focusing on medicine that can generate the most profit, often (always?) at the expense and detriment of the patient. Ailments that do not generate a profit are either overlooked, or for the people that suffer for them, the medicine is jacked up to astronomical proportions to cover the more limited market. Meanwhile the vast majority of medical innovation and research is publicly funded -- which makes the ethics and morality of for-profit medicine highly suspect. Just look at some of the stories surrounding Joe Manchin's family.

Do you notice that appliances tend to break down more than they have in the past? That's by design, either through increased cost cutting in the manufacturing, or specifically to get you to replace those appliances. A good percentage of those products are simply destroyed, because it's more profitable to do so.

Green energy could transform this planet, even by capitalist metrics, but in the short term its cheaper (and thus more lucrative for the existing corporate infrastructure) to utilize fossil fuels -- even though the costs are absorbed by (and from) the public, not to mention the planet.

If profit is the motivation behind innovation in a capitalist economy, what incentive is there to actually create better products / medicine / energy extraction technology -- especially if innovation changes the profit structure?

Socialists say the funniest gosh damned things.

Let's consider a simple hypothetical. We have two innovations competing for funding, Product Idea A and Product Idea B. While no one ever has a crystal ball, let us suppose, for argument's sake, that Product Idea A holds the most promise; it will deliver the most benefit to customers, create the most employment, and generate the most tax revenue. Let us also suppose that Product Idea B offers the sole, yet happy coincidence that it will mean more jobs only in the home district of the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.

Which idea will receive investment in a market economy and which in a centrally managed economy?

 

[Antiwar]

It's a heavy lift to assign the burden of repairing the climate to an economic ideology that isn't remotely close to being implemented (after capitalism has utterly decimated it). However, we can start with the objectives of the Green New Deal (by the way, not a socialist concept):

• Providing investments and leveraging funding to help communities affected by climate change
• Repairing and upgrading existing infrastructure to withstand extreme weather and ensuring all bills related to infrastructure in Congress address climate change
• Investing in renewable power sources
• Investing in manufacturing and industry to spur growth in the use of clean energy
• Building or upgrading to energy-efficient, distributed, and smart power grids that provide affordable electricity
• Upgrading all existing buildings and building new ones so that they achieve maximum energy efficiency, water efficiency, safety, affordability, comfort, and durability.
• Supporting family farming, investing in sustainable farming, and building a more sustainable and equitable food system
• Investing in transportation systems, namely zero-emission vehicle infrastructure and manufacturing, public transit, and high-speed rail
• Restoring ecosystems through land preservation, afforestation, and science-based projects
• Cleaning up existing hazardous waste and abandoned sites
• Identifying unknown sources of pollution and emissions
• Working with the international community on solutions and helping them achieve Green New Deals

These all exist within the capitalist frame work and are very achievable.

Good answer. But I didn't assign the burden to an economic ideology (see next point).
----

A major flaw in your critique of what you're incorrectly calling 'capitalism': Nearly all (if not all) current formal economies are mixed economies, with the two main ingredients being capitalism and socialism.
----

The US Green Party has been flirting with ecosocialism.

 

[NatMorton]

Left-wing logic: People who earn and invest their own money make careless investments. People who appropriate and invest other people's money make good investments.

 

[Fishking]

No it is not

Of course it is. Without it you do not have choice, control, or freedom.

 

[Dans La Lune]

Good answer. But I didn't assign the burden to an economic ideology (see next point).
----

A major flaw in your critique of what you're incorrectly calling 'capitalism': Nearly all (if not all) current formal economies are mixed economies, with the two main ingredients being capitalism and socialism.

I somewhat agree, but it depends on your definition of socialism -- and its place on the spectrum. While government intervention can be considered of socialism (i.e. profits are privatized, costs are socialized through taxes), socialism as an economic system is more about who owns the means of production (and thus who profits from it). However, it kind of muddies the definition, something I myself have been guilty of. Just as capitalism is not synonymous with barter, socialism is not synonymous with government intervention (otherwise the operations of the CIA would be a form of socialism, even though the CIA has historically intervened to save capitalism and sabotage socialism).

Work within a company can be done under a capitalist system, but a business can socialize the profits of a business by choice. This was done at a pizza shop, where the profits went towards the worker's wages for one day. The workers earned ~$78 an hour. The problem is that within a capitalist system profits are designed and incentivized to accrue to a single point, rather than be dispersed among the workers according to their actual worth. Capitalism rewards growth over all else (even sustainability), and cutting costs -- especially labor. Labor unions exists to pool the bargaining power of the workers, and strike a balance between their interests and those of the capitalist. This is not socialism, either, but just a way to mitigate exploitation.

I also agree that a balance between socialism and capitalism is the most viable goal for socialism. Although capitalism is uncompromising, and by its very nature seeks to eliminate socialism (in this case, government intervention / laws that interfere with growth). The problem for capitalism is that growth is not infinite, and the goal of maximizing growth will inevitably cut into the lives of the people who maintain the system (almost exactly analogous to cancer). At which point its a choice between fascism and socialism, with fascism having an edge in likelihood. Capitalism will always side with profit, as it did in Nazi Germany. #godwin

 

[Dans La Lune]

Left-wing logic: People who earn and invest their own money make careless investments. People who appropriate and invest other people's money make good investments.

Libertarian logic: Profit is achieved by a single person, rather than the people who do the actual work. Other people's money indeed.

 

[Dans La Lune]

Let's consider a simple hypothetical. We have two innovations competing for funding, Product Idea A and Product Idea B. While no one ever has a crystal ball, let us suppose, for argument's sake, that Product Idea A holds the most promise; it will deliver the most benefit to customers, create the most employment, and generate the most tax revenue. Let us also suppose that Product Idea B offers the sole, yet happy coincidence that it will mean more jobs only in the home district of the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.

Which idea will receive investment in a market economy and which in a centrally managed economy?

What's Product Idea A and B? Pharmaceuticals? Give me some details.

In a capitalist economy, the one which seems most likely to generate the most profit (for shareholders) will receive the most private investment, regardless of the quality or sustainability of that product, or what it does to the environment. The profits will accrue to the top, and likely there won't be any taxes paid (except by the laborers).

Although I need a realistic scenario to fully explore your hypothetical. I know that in a capitalist-heavy economy (with politicians being bought by corporate interests), government funding tends to follow billionaire ideas and investments. How has that turned out? Bill Gates education reform ideas has utterly decimated public education. Who ****ing knows what Elon Musk has done in this regard, but I'm sure it will be in a footnote of the New York Times within a decade.

 

[RealityNow]

The incentive structure of capitalism requires that all innovation be profit-driven, rather than aimed producing the most effective, most efficient, or best product. In healthcare, it means focusing on medicine that can generate the most profit, often (always?) at the expense and detriment of the patient. Ailments that do not generate a profit are either overlooked, or for the people that suffer for them, the medicine is jacked up to astronomical proportions to cover the more limited market. Meanwhile the vast majority of medical innovation and research is publicly funded -- which makes the ethics and morality of for-profit medicine highly suspect. Just look at some of the stories surrounding Joe Manchin's family.

Do you notice that appliances tend to break down more than they have in the past? That's by design, either through increased cost cutting in the manufacturing, or specifically to get you to replace those appliances. A good percentage of those products are simply destroyed, because it's more profitable to do so.

Green energy could transform this planet, even by capitalist metrics, but in the short term its cheaper (and thus more lucrative for the existing corporate infrastructure) to utilize fossil fuels -- even though the costs are absorbed by (and from) the public, not to mention the planet.

If profit is the motivation behind innovation in a capitalist economy, what incentive is there to actually create better products / medicine / energy extraction technology -- especially if innovation changes the profit structure?

Capitalism is a Monetary System Ideology, that uses Denominational currency to facilitate a means for fair exchange.... It's Greed and the extremenity of Greed which is Avarice, that damages the system of Capitalism.

Having more dollars that buys less and less is the ignorance of man, which does nothing but destroy the purchasing power of Denominational Currency.

Do we need to descend into being a nation with denominational currency with $100,000 dollar notes, that only purchase what $10 would purchase. Such ignorance is what has led various nation that have those crazy high denominational currency, that won't even buy a loaf of bread.

Will having silliness like this appease the greed mentality of those who can't understand the destruction of denominational currency's purchasing power.

Consider the ignorance of this​

 

[What if...?]

The incentive structure of capitalism requires that all innovation be profit-driven, rather than aimed producing the most effective, most efficient, or best product. In healthcare, it means focusing on medicine that can generate the most profit, often (always?) at the expense and detriment of the patient. Ailments that do not generate a profit are either overlooked, or for the people that suffer for them, the medicine is jacked up to astronomical proportions to cover the more limited market. Meanwhile the vast majority of medical innovation and research is publicly funded -- which makes the ethics and morality of for-profit medicine highly suspect. Just look at some of the stories surrounding Joe Manchin's family.

Do you notice that appliances tend to break down more than they have in the past? That's by design, either through increased cost cutting in the manufacturing, or specifically to get you to replace those appliances. A good percentage of those products are simply destroyed, because it's more profitable to do so.

Green energy could transform this planet, even by capitalist metrics, but in the short term its cheaper (and thus more lucrative for the existing corporate infrastructure) to utilize fossil fuels -- even though the costs are absorbed by (and from) the public, not to mention the planet.

If profit is the motivation behind innovation in a capitalist economy, what incentive is there to actually create better products / medicine / energy extraction technology -- especially if innovation changes the profit structure?

Yup. Everything in our society, our business models as well as our social constructs are the most profitable versions attainable.

My family had one toaster and one manual can opener for my entire childhood. Now they’re only good for a couple of years if that.

My “dream model” for the world would be that everything made is the very best quality version of that thing. Think old Mercedes. They would be more expensive, but not need to be replaced much. And if they were replaced for the “newest,hottest” their old one is sold to someone who will continue to use it. Repeat all the way to the third world.

When our solar panels reach the end of their useful life they still have 85% of their capacity. I’m quite sure some third world people would love to have 85% solar panels when they have 0% electricity now.

We are wasteful. Horribly so. And would likely be happier if our institutions were the best for everybody instead of just the most profitable versions.

 

[RealityNow]

Yup. Everything in our society, our business models as well as our social constructs are the most profitable versions attainable.

My family had one toaster and one manual can opener for my entire childhood. Now they’re only good for a couple of years if that.

My “dream model” for the world would be that everything made is the very best quality version of that thing. Think old Mercedes. They would be more expensive, but not need to be replaced much. And if they were replaced for the “newest,hottest” their old one is sold to someone who will continue to use it. Repeat all the way to the third world.

When our solar panels reach the end of their useful life they still have 85% of their capacity. I’m quite sure some third world people would love to have 85% solar panels when they have 0% electricity now.

We are wasteful. Horribly so. And would likely be happier if our institutions were the best for everybody instead of just the most profitable versions.

Every since the ideology of "Increase The Intent To Repurchase" became the Mentality Them and Ideoology of Corporations.... EVERYTHING is made to be obsolete. Some things one cannot even get replacement parts for it.

In Earlier Time, part of an Automotive Industry's Profit Model, was selling "Spare Replacement Parts". This new breed of Corporate Imbeciles, have ignored all of that, and all they can think is to produce cheap low quality short life span goods. Result: We have more non usable junk scattered around the world every years.

It's crazy that we don't use "glass containers" for various foods.. if we did we'd have less plastic damaging everything, and glass recycling would be very big business.

I would have loved to have one of the Old Mercedes, I wish I'd kept my 1984 Porsche and my 1989 Porsche, they were built like "tanks", Even the 1989 Benz, was far more solid than the Benz of today. (Those were built before "everyone and their uncle too started buying Benz and Porsche).
I had two BMW, a 80's model 530 and 530i, both were very solid cars. The newer models just don't seem to have the solidity of the older models.

I still buy Benz, because the E Class is built very well, I won't buy one of the C Class or the CLA; what really weird is the S Class I see so many of them continually in the shop.

__________
Over the years, I've learned not to buy "low quality things because its low cost, just to say I have a thing". It's better to buy "quality", even if you have to buy it used, its better than buying new low quality things because the cost is cheap. I look at "function" and durability of functioning.

Greed damages the System of Capitalism, its not that Capitalism is bad... its that Greed is Prized over Respect and Responsibility and Greed ignores Ethics.
I am thankful to be able to say:
I try to avoid buying lots of things on credit. Currently, I only have a car payment, that I plan to pay off soon, the less I owe, the better it is for me.
No one can come and remove anything from my home for lack of payment.

• I've been that way since very young, if it's in my home, then its mine and I like knowing I paid for it and no one can come and take it for non payment.

I certainly don't buy clothes and shoes on credit, I use pre paid cards, so there is no bill to come later, If I want to go on a trip, I just put more money on the pre-paid card. Years, ago... I could carry American Express Travelers Checks.
I don't buy anything from anyone calling me or sending me an email trying to sell me something.
____________

People can curb the Corporate Greed, by not falling for their excessive advertisement, and if they jack up the prices, one simply can go find the product some other place, and in many cases one can do without it.
Look around your own home and things you've bought as must have, which you no longer even use, and in some cases people have it in a storage shed or attic, never to be seen or used again. Antiques, that's a different matter, but remember not everything that is old, will not vastly increase in value, just because its old.

 

[PoS]

Give me specifics about the GREATEST innovations of capitalism.

Aside from making everyone poor and starving, what has socialism done?

 

[RealityNow]

It's a heavy lift to assign the burden of repairing the climate to an economic ideology that isn't remotely close to being implemented (after capitalism has utterly decimated it). However, we can start with the objectives of the Green New Deal (by the way, not a socialist concept):

• Providing investments and leveraging funding to help communities affected by climate change
• Repairing and upgrading existing infrastructure to withstand extreme weather and ensuring all bills related to infrastructure in Congress address climate change
• Investing in renewable power sources
• Investing in manufacturing and industry to spur growth in the use of clean energy
• Building or upgrading to energy-efficient, distributed, and smart power grids that provide affordable electricity
• Upgrading all existing buildings and building new ones so that they achieve maximum energy efficiency, water efficiency, safety, affordability, comfort, and durability.
• Supporting family farming, investing in sustainable farming, and building a more sustainable and equitable food system
• Investing in transportation systems, namely zero-emission vehicle infrastructure and manufacturing, public transit, and high-speed rail
• Restoring ecosystems through land preservation, afforestation, and science-based projects
• Cleaning up existing hazardous waste and abandoned sites
• Identifying unknown sources of pollution and emissions
• Working with the international community on solutions and helping them achieve Green New Deals

These all exist within the capitalist frame work and are very achievable.

YES!!!! These things will create 10's of thousands of jobs if not 100's of thousands of "sustainable jobs".
If we look across this nation as what is actually "needed", we'd know that America is due not only for the Green New Deal, but exactly what Obama said 14yrs ago. "We Must Rebuild From The Bottom Up".
It's sad that racism and willful ignorance fought him, and detested his intellect and forward thinking, because his ideas were about the future and its still proving that it was decades ahead of what the average person who fought him could comprehend. We'd be so much improved in people had only listened and not let racism's ignorance overtake them, and if they'd been willing to let go of chasing the past and turned to pursuing the future.
Thank goodness we have Biden/Harris, because Biden was right there with Obama and he was onboard with thinking of the future, so if these bigots that chase the past would get out of the way, We can continue moving forward, so the next 14 yrs won't see us wishing we had listened.

 

[Deuce]

Yes, because those appliances were unregulated in the past. Today appliance manufacturers have to build appliances the way the filthy government wants, instead of what the consumer wants. The increased complexity to comply with all of the mandates and regulations is what is ruining the appliance market.

Appliance Regulations Are Bringing Back Dirt, Filth, and Disease – The Heartland Institute

www.heartland.org

Low-flow toilets cause a stink in SF

Skimping on toilet water has resulted in more sludge backing up inside the sewer pipes,...

www.sfgate.com

Sam Kazman: How Washington Ruined Your Washing Machine

In The Wall Street Journal, Sam Kazman of the Competitive Enterprise Institute writes that the top-loading washer continues to disappear, thanks to the usual nanny state suspects.

www.wsj.com

Lawsuit aims to cleanse federal regulations hampering washing machines, dishwashers

(The Center Square) – Twelve attorneys general filed an opening brief Friday in a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for changes made this year to energy and

www.thecentersquare.com

What Has Government Done to Our Bathrooms?

The net effect of all of this has been to ruin our bathrooms. You might not realize it because the change has been slow, extending over 25 years. Only by encountering a bathroom with original fixtures from the 1940s can you perceive the full horror of what has happened. Our showers are lame, our...

www.aier.org

And there is no end in sight:

Opinion | A Regulatory Burden for Every Room of Your House

The Biden administration moves to make appliances more expensive and less effective.

www.wsj.com

lol, appliance regulations aren't the reason they break down faster.

 

[cpwill]

The thing responsible for the most innovative in human history is somehow responsible for hindering it? Weird theory.

Yes. This is why communist countries were so famously the driver of technological advancements.

 

[Cordelier]

The incentive structure of capitalism requires that all innovation be profit-driven, rather than aimed producing the most effective, most efficient, or best product. In healthcare, it means focusing on medicine that can generate the most profit, often (always?) at the expense and detriment of the patient. Ailments that do not generate a profit are either overlooked, or for the people that suffer for them, the medicine is jacked up to astronomical proportions to cover the more limited market. Meanwhile the vast majority of medical innovation and research is publicly funded -- which makes the ethics and morality of for-profit medicine highly suspect. Just look at some of the stories surrounding Joe Manchin's family.

Do you notice that appliances tend to break down more than they have in the past? That's by design, either through increased cost cutting in the manufacturing, or specifically to get you to replace those appliances. A good percentage of those products are simply destroyed, because it's more profitable to do so.

Green energy could transform this planet, even by capitalist metrics, but in the short term its cheaper (and thus more lucrative for the existing corporate infrastructure) to utilize fossil fuels -- even though the costs are absorbed by (and from) the public, not to mention the planet.

If profit is the motivation behind innovation in a capitalist economy, what incentive is there to actually create better products / medicine / energy extraction technology -- especially if innovation changes the profit structure?

I think that's true after a certain point when companies are allowed (by lack of regulation) to become too big and bloated.

After 2008, I think we should all have come to the realization that no corporation should ever be allowed to become "too big to fail." But we didn't. I think we need to take a serious look at having the Justice Department take a far more aggressive stance where it comes to anti-trust enforcement.

 

[What if...?]

Every since the ideology of "Increase The Intent To Repurchase" became the Mentality Them and Ideoology of Corporations.... EVERYTHING is made to be obsolete. Some things one cannot even get replacement parts for it.

In Earlier Time, part of an Automotive Industry's Profit Model, was selling "Spare Replacement Parts". This new breed of Corporate Imbeciles, have ignored all of that, and all they can think is to produce cheap low quality short life span goods. Result: We have more non usable junk scattered around the world every years.

It's crazy that we don't use "glass containers" for various foods.. if we did we'd have less plastic damaging everything, and glass recycling would be very big business.

I would have loved to have one of the Old Mercedes, I wish I'd kept my 1984 Porsche and my 1989 Porsche, they were built like "tanks", Even the 1989 Benz, was far more solid than the Benz of today. (Those were built before "everyone and their uncle too started buying Benz and Porsche).
I had two BMW, a 80's model 530 and 530i, both were very solid cars. The newer models just don't seem to have the solidity of the older models.

I still buy Benz, because the E Class is built very well, I won't buy one of the C Class or the CLA; what really weird is the S Class I see so many of them continually in the shop.

__________
Over the years, I've learned not to buy "low quality things because its low cost, just to say I have a thing". It's better to buy "quality", even if you have to buy it used, its better than buying new low quality things because the cost is cheap. I look at "function" and durability of functioning.

Greed damages the System of Capitalism, its not that Capitalism is bad... its that Greed is Prized over Respect and Responsibility and Greed ignores Ethics.
I am thankful to be able to say:
I try to avoid buying lots of things on credit. Currently, I only have a car payment, that I plan to pay off soon, the less I owe, the better it is for me.
No one can come and remove anything from my home for lack of payment.

• I've been that way since very young, if it's in my home, then its mine and I like knowing I paid for it and no one can come and take it for non payment.

I certainly don't buy clothes and shoes on credit, I use pre paid cards, so there is no bill to come later, If I want to go on a trip, I just put more money on the pre-paid card. Years, ago... I could carry American Express Travelers Checks.
I don't buy anything from anyone calling me or sending me an email trying to sell me something.
____________

People can curb the Corporate Greed, by not falling for their excessive advertisement, and if they jack up the prices, one simply can go find the product some other place, and in many cases one can do without it.
Look around your own home and things you've bought as must have, which you no longer even use, and in some cases people have it in a storage shed or attic, never to be seen or used again. Antiques, that's a different matter, but remember not everything that is old, will not vastly increase in value, just because its old.

I also decided that I would rather have fewer high quality things than myriad cheap ones.

There’s something about well made, durable things that’s pleases me on a visceral level.

And the only reason I use credit is to build enough to buy some dirt to retire on. My credit score was literally zero when I started to use credit at 48.

 

[RealityNow]

I also decided that I would rather have fewer high quality things than myriad cheap ones.

There’s something about well made, durable things that’s pleases me on a visceral level.

And the only reason I use credit is to build enough to buy some dirt to retire on. My credit score was literally zero when I started to use credit at 48.

I also, don't go into buying "fad" things. I don't chase designer label things, If I find one that is good and made well, and happens to have a designer label on it, thats fine. But... for people who don't understand the structure. Designer Stores that offer its Specific Brand, is where they send the actual higher quality products that Designer Signature Inspected Quality is Sold.. when those Designer Label Goods are sold in various stores that have License and they sell it for a few dollars less... It is not, the same as the Original Designer Product from the Actual Designers Special Collection".... those License get "Mass Consumer Produced Quality, not the "Select Special Collection" Quality.

Go and feel the fabric of a shirt in a Designer owned stores and then compare it in "feel" to what you get at a Licensed Distributor, there's a difference that the discriminating informed person would detect.

It's like making a Photo copy of a documents, ... regardless of what, its still a photo copy and not the original. Original is exactly what the word means, Original.

Original

1. Preceding all others in time; first.
2. Not derived from something else; fresh and unusual.

 

[Indydave]

The incentive structure of capitalism requires that all innovation be profit-driven, rather than aimed producing the most effective, most efficient, or best product. In healthcare, it means focusing on medicine that can generate the most profit, often (always?) at the expense and detriment of the patient. Ailments that do not generate a profit are either overlooked, or for the people that suffer for them, the medicine is jacked up to astronomical proportions to cover the more limited market. Meanwhile the vast majority of medical innovation and research is publicly funded -- which makes the ethics and morality of for-profit medicine highly suspect. Just look at some of the stories surrounding Joe Manchin's family.

Do you notice that appliances tend to break down more than they have in the past? That's by design, either through increased cost cutting in the manufacturing, or specifically to get you to replace those appliances. A good percentage of those products are simply destroyed, because it's more profitable to do so.

Green energy could transform this planet, even by capitalist metrics, but in the short term its cheaper (and thus more lucrative for the existing corporate infrastructure) to utilize fossil fuels -- even though the costs are absorbed by (and from) the public, not to mention the planet.

If profit is the motivation behind innovation in a capitalist economy, what incentive is there to actually create better products / medicine / energy extraction technology -- especially if innovation changes the profit structure?

as long as there is one drop of oil in the ground there will be little reason to pursue alternate energy........and as long as we as a species only pay lip service to being moral and to being Christian what's good for us will take a back seat to what is profitable for us.....

 

[bomberfox]

Newer does not mean better. It just means newer.

The fact that it's more cost effect to mass destroy products to keep the supply chain limited should tell you something.

As a worker in a company that uses Amazon for distribution, i can attest to how much of a pain in the ass it is to work with them and how wasteful they can be.

 

[bomberfox]

Good answer. But I didn't assign the burden to an economic ideology (see next point).
----

A major flaw in your critique of what you're incorrectly calling 'capitalism': Nearly all (if not all) current formal economies are mixed economies, with the two main ingredients being capitalism and socialism.
----

The US Green Party has been flirting with ecosocialism.

A mixed economy is still a capitalist economy. A mixed economy does not change the mode of production.

 

[RealityNow]

As a worker in a company that uses Amazon for distribution, i can attest to how much of a pain in the ass it is to work with them and how wasteful they can be.

This is very bad.... for the earth... it might benefit those who want to limit quantity and keep prices high, but it also tells us that over production is and likely always has been a big issue. I guess economist would say the high production keeps people working, but it cost us all in other ways as well, i.e. depletion of resources, manufacture of more toxic substances and materials and things that don't break down to a natural state even in the lifetime of some of our lives.
I don't know what the resolution answer could be or is !

It happens in almost every commodity category, including "food", where some crops are destroyed to keep the prices at a certain price point.
We even have the problems with older housing in some areas, that are left to deteriorate, even while we have a growing homeless population. many cities have areas of houses that fall in the category of adjudicated status, and some are suitable in structure to be "Re-habilitated".
Imagine if some of the HUD money that pays Section 8 to people for decades, could be used to rehab those houses, and make them available to "some" of people who receive Section 8, which means they would no longer be on Section 8 for decades upon decades. It might save $100's of Billions a year, as well as curb the landlords exaggerated rent rates, who jack up rent on housing, because they know Section 8 will pay.

Maybe if people use A.I. for these type of things rather than mimicking entertainers and other things that benefit nothing, and use the application to identify issues and challenges, and provide a list of alternatives.
Our Nation is far too big to rely on "understaffed" agencies to keep track and be more efficient in arriving at solutions and tracking the performance of those solutions.

Maybe we can learn how to better use technology.
Even with things like these Forums. Instead of a lot of slap stick negativity, these type of forums could be better used to explore the details of subject matters and present informative information; rather than the litany of spinning drama for the momentary ego elation of the moment, and slap stick pun's for the sake of people playing "gotcha' games".

 

[Indydave]

The incentive structure of capitalism requires that all innovation be profit-driven, rather than aimed producing the most effective, most efficient, or best product. In healthcare, it means focusing on medicine that can generate the most profit, often (always?) at the expense and detriment of the patient. Ailments that do not generate a profit are either overlooked, or for the people that suffer for them, the medicine is jacked up to astronomical proportions to cover the more limited market. Meanwhile the vast majority of medical innovation and research is publicly funded -- which makes the ethics and morality of for-profit medicine highly suspect. Just look at some of the stories surrounding Joe Manchin's family.

Do you notice that appliances tend to break down more than they have in the past? That's by design, either through increased cost cutting in the manufacturing, or specifically to get you to replace those appliances. A good percentage of those products are simply destroyed, because it's more profitable to do so.

Green energy could transform this planet, even by capitalist metrics, but in the short term its cheaper (and thus more lucrative for the existing corporate infrastructure) to utilize fossil fuels -- even though the costs are absorbed by (and from) the public, not to mention the planet.

If profit is the motivation behind innovation in a capitalist economy, what incentive is there to actually create better products / medicine / energy extraction technology -- especially if innovation changes the profit structure?

well yeah but the great thing about living in a nation with our Constitution is we guaranteed the right to innovate if we so desire...ie Henry Ford or Alexander Bell or inventors of the personal computer etc.........capitalism as we know it today is just the most efficient method of sustaining progress and providing a living for most of us........obviously it has a lot of short comings.......if we as a species can ever get over this maddening pride we each are cursed with and live as Jesus taught us the issues you describe will be obsolete........

 

[RealityNow]

well yeah but the great thing about living in a nation with our Constitution is we guaranteed the right to innovate if we so desire...ie Henry Ford or Alexander Bell or inventors of the personal computer etc.........capitalism as we know it today is just the most efficient method of sustaining progress and providing a living for most of us........obviously it has a lot of short comings.......if we as a species can ever get over this maddening pride we each are cursed with and live as Jesus taught us the issues you describe will be obsolete........

quote

Capitalism
Different forms of capitalism feature varying degrees of free markets, public ownership,[8] obstacles to free competition and state-sanctioned social policies. The degree of competition in markets and the role of intervention and regulation as well as the scope of state ownership vary across different models of capitalism.[9][10] The extent to which different markets are free and the rules defining private property are matters of politics and policy. Most of the existing capitalist economies are mixed economies that combine elements of free markets with state intervention and in some cases economic planning.

The term "capitalist", meaning an owner of capital, appears earlier than the term "capitalism" and dates to the mid-17th century. "Capitalism" is derived from capital, which evolved from capitale, a late Latin word based on caput, meaning "head"—which is also the origin of "chattel" and "cattle" in the sense of movable property (only much later to refer only to livestock). Capitale emerged in the 12th to 13th centuries to refer to funds, stock of merchandise, sum of money or money carrying interest.[20]: 232 [21] By 1283, it was used in the sense of the capital assets of a trading firm and was often interchanged with other words—wealth, money, funds, goods, assets, property and so on
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These people don't understand that Capitalism, in its basic format is a Monetary System that is regulated and policies govern its forms of exchanges, and that ultimately is based in the usage of "Denominational Currency", which is an efficient means of exchange, to back a variety of instruments utilized in the broad systems of "exchange", which is done in manners that generate "a profit"..
PERIOD!!!
It was never designed for "Slothful Gluttonous Hording". 'All Currency technically belongs to the Government that issues and backs it, its dispensed into the system of society, to be utilize to make exchange efficient. (no one has to drag around a herd of sheep and cattle and etc, to do exchanges with others), they can utilize a variety of financial instruments, contracts, and denominational currency.)

• Greed is a man created vice, that drive him to be slothful and want to be a glutton and hoard, and them delude himself that money make him more than he is.

Every system has a Medium they use for "Exchange for Goods and Services" and that is the principle of using a Monetary system that uses for form of denominational currency to facilitate exchange.

If people stop passing along folklore concepts and learn the meaning of words and how they are applied, they would not be so quick to claim Capitalism is bad, its not Capitalism that's bad, its the Avarice in the mentality of People.