beyelzu

let me explain the mentality of a poor person. As a child my familty didnt have running water for about 4 years of my life. I used an outhouse. What clothes I did have came from goodwill, I know quite a bit about being poor. I also decided that I never wanted to be poor again. I believe in capitalism not becuase I am rich, I am not, but because it offers the oppurtunity for advancement. I am 26 and make around 30k a year, not great but not bad. If all goes well I will be making around 60 within the next 3 yrs. Am I rich no, but I am no longer poor thats for damn sure. In a capitalist county anyone can become rich enough that they can go to europe on vacation and hire someone to come in and clean their house a couple of times a week. We by and large own cars and cable television and cd players and all sorts of crap. We also have political freedom.

beyelzu

pot kettle black?

I have often said that amnesty international is a corrupt lying organization designed to uphold capitalism and the american way of life. Thats why they criticize us all the time for having the death penalty. I have read that.


By the way, the Japan did attack us, you realize that right????

wait thats probablyjust a anticommunist lie isnt it.

RED DAVE

From Beyelzu:

Which capitalist country are you referring to? Mexico, Guatamala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Iraq, Iran, Libya, Egypt, India?

Formal political freedom in some of these countries: yes. A few can afford these things in all of them: yes. But mass poverty is the case in most capitalist countries and political freedom is a bitter joke in many.

RED DAVE

beyelzu

do you not see the gross contradiction in what you just said. constraining anticastro propaganda but its more free than america where people routinely criticize the gov. more free than an america where making fun of the prez is as american as mom, dad, and apple pie.

beyelzu

Lets say america and europe and in the future perhaps those other countries will catch up. I do realize that I should have said in the first world nations or the like. I dothink that there is a greater chance of growth in capitalist countires .

beyelzu

In response to your pm cuz I couldnt reply cuz you have too many messages.

I think I have the coolest job on earth.

pocket knives, swords, novelty lighters, daggers, tasers, handcuffs, glass knickknacks.

we make most of our money on daggers and swords though.

and thanks for the happy birthday wish.

I do want you to know that I may attack you point of view, but I do enjoy talking to you.

RED DAVE

From Beyelzu:

There are no contries except capitalist countries. (So-called exceptions such as Cuba and North Korea, are state capitalist.) How are these countries to catch up if the rate of capital accumulation is lower than those of the major industrial countries? We are talking about huge countries. Nigeria, for example, has a population of 130 million. And let's not even think about China and India, which between them contain 1/3 of the population of the entire world.

RED DAVE

Vorkosigan

You know, it isn't impossible to get rich quickly. Taiwan, S Korea, Singapore, Japan, all did it in less than a century. Had it not been for the stupid war, the Japanese probably would have caught the US twenty years earlier. China is currently on that path. Most of the problems the Chinese face will result from rapid growth, an ossified political system, systemic corruption, and resource decline. The size of the population is not an issue, and might even be an advantage when the economy grows a little, since a large domestic market is an enormous advantage in global competition. India could easily move onto that path, if the government would free up the market.

Communist countries will remain mired in stagnation and poverty for reasons everyone knows. If Cuba became capitalist, it would boom. North Korea could to, but it would have to follow a different path than S Korea or Taiwan. North Korea faces the same problem as every other Asian developing country: China. CHina has an endless supply of workers.....I was just reading in FEER(?) the other day that at many Chinese factories where young women are employed there are so many applicants for jobs that they take only women who have perfect vision -- they don't wear glasses -- none of the workers wears glasses. How can North Korea compete with that? Whatever growth trajectory North Korea follows -- and I can't imagine what it is going to look like -- it won't be the E Asia tradition of import-substitution and export promotion, followed by massive growth in human capital and movement into advanced manufacturing. China will already occupy much of that.

Vorkosigan

RED DAVE

From Vorkosigan:

Growth figures for these countries are extraordinarily misleading on a world scale.

Taiwan - population 22.3 million
South Korea - population 48.3 million
singapore - population 4.5 million

Total - 75.1 million

Even granted that these countries have achieved parity with the major industrial countries (ignoring questions of real wages, income distribution, etc.), these are small countries and they are the only ones that have "made it." Every other country in the world outside of the majors, has not. (Japan does not count, it was clearly headed to be the major capitalist country of Asia over a hundrd years ago, comparable to, say, Germany.)

This is aproximately like looking at the income of three billionaires and saying that everyone in the USA can make it.

RED DAVE

Me and Me

" Well look at this billionaire, if he can do it eeeeeeeeeeeeverybody can do it."

That has to be the most widely used defense of Capitalism and one of the biggest pieces of propaganda. even though it means nothing, because under a capitalist structure success means in spite of other people. The few who do make it, (Keep in mind they make it by loans therefore it is only by acceptance by previous few billionaires if another one is allowed) make it from the sweat and labor of other people, so their success is determined by and made by the keeping down of other people in society.