Banking and Conspiracies
- Thread starter phildwyer
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slaar said:
I"ll forget about the gazumping.
Yes, agreed, only a small amount relatively that are destitue. But they're visible. What about the invisible? People who've just cleared the food clothing and shelter hurdle, just, and no more?? I reckon there's loads of them.
Outside of bangkok, probably a similar proportion in britain as thailand. And what does that say for capitalism? Fourth richest country vs a typical developing country (ie, a halfway house)?
you seem to think that one cannot think money is just a representation, because it is so important. you think it is so important that it is a metaphysical entity, i think.
i'm saying that some well-known important metaphysical enhties have shown to be nothing of the sort. For example 'god'
I'm also questioning whther anyone can sensibly say that money is as real as e.g. elctrons, or atoms, gravity, etc.
i'm saying that some well-known important metaphysical enhties have shown to be nothing of the sort. For example 'god'
I'm also questioning whther anyone can sensibly say that money is as real as e.g. elctrons, or atoms, gravity, etc.
Fair enough, I would agree that inequality is very high in the UK and that there are a lot of people struggling. But this is different from dying of malnutrition, diarrhoeal infections or exposure.fela fan said:
But overall in the world, welfare indicators (life expectancy, literacy etc) are very highly correlated with wealth.
slaar said:
Perhaps discussions like this need to be defaulted along the lines of food clothing and shelter.
After that i see thailand and i know england, and i find it very difficult to put england ahead of thailand in terms of welfare of life and wealth of mind and soul...
And because of that i find it difficult to accept rampant capitalism as a better system than whatever it is that developing countries have.
That is probably my angle on my contributions to this thread.
118118 said:
However much freedom of mind and freedom of life i've obtained, i still need to get hold of money. I therefore place my totality of freedom in the hands of having enough money.
And since i place freedom as the most important concept in my human life, i recognise the need for money. Not much, just enough, but nevertheless, i still need the bloody stuff. And in the absence of some benefactors, that means i have to work.
And with work comes interest and money and capital and power abuse and the whole gamut of capitalism. It's a fuckin horror show man.
Developed countries have a much more rampant version of capitalism than many developing countries, in terms of the amount of activity undertaken by government (collectively) as opposed to privately (individually or corporately)fela fan said:
And I'd bet a very significant amount that food, clothing and shelter are far, far better in England than in Thailand.
maybe it has some kind of "existential" reality. tho i am not sure what that would entail - an inherent meaning to mortals?
that tho, in itself, means that it could be argued that, again, it is a matter of practical variables that determines where money is "created". tho, iirc, a real existentialist would argue for the same principle in pretty much anything.
to sum mo: 'money' is only cearted at A and not B, because of our way of life. but this has few restrictions on what we can deduce from whatevber state of affiars regarding when money is created, pertains.
that tho, in itself, means that it could be argued that, again, it is a matter of practical variables that determines where money is "created". tho, iirc, a real existentialist would argue for the same principle in pretty much anything.
to sum mo: 'money' is only cearted at A and not B, because of our way of life. but this has few restrictions on what we can deduce from whatevber state of affiars regarding when money is created, pertains.
slaar said:
Well, don't be betting with me then!
But that was why i wanted this as a minimum to be the default in any discussions of this sort. It seem obvious that england should have more wealth across the board than thailand. But that in itself is not a justification of rampant capitalism as practised by britain, and not by thailand, even though they're on their way towards this system.
Britain as the fourth richest country in the world should not have a single person on the streets begging for money. The fact that it does is an issue well worth investigating.
118118 said:
Well, you're going fucking kilometers over my head man! I have life work to do with regard to money, and i need enough of it to retain the freedom i need in life.
It is a very real thing, and people need it.
But do they get it at a price? Ie with an interest attached to it, and therefore putting their lives into debt?
In capitalism, the majority do, in other systems maybe not. I lived in the former and was subjected to the inevitability of debt, then i moved to a non-capitalist society and escaped the slavery of debt.
I am free under whatever system it is that thailand operates under, yet this was impossible in my own country, britain. I keep asking questions about this...
You think Thailand is not rampantly capitalist? I'd argue it is, much more so than the UK. Bangkok is not exactly a model of a non-capitalist city, it's sucking in people and materials from outside like in a classic capitalist industrial revolution. The UK has far more services provided by the state.
kyser_soze
Hawking's Angry Eyebrow
Hmm, my own limited experience of Thailand is of a country that is far more capitalistic than the UK - from the street vendors and the hawkers upwards, my impression was of a people who are determined to press on for wealth, with a strong buddhist ethic underlying that process. Despite what some people write on here the UK is far from being utlra capitalist - socialised educations, healthcare, welfare state etc are not the indicators of 'ultra capitalism' - you'd need to go back to the early Victorian period for that and even then it didn't last too long before the moral backlash against it's extremities began, and TBH Thailand seemed to have more in common with Victorian Britain than the UK today (child labour anyone?)
Right, I totally agree. That's the point about developing countries (see my post on Brainaddict's thread too), they're arguably much more nakedly capitalist than more developed countries. It's quite hard to get to good social services and widespread prosperity without going through that stage it seems if past experience is anything to go by.kyser_soze said:
I don't understand where the problem is here ADB. You seem to have things upside down.A Dashing Blade said:
Perhaps I can quote from wikipedia - Open Market Operations
If a central bank buys government securities, then the money supply is increased, which is the money creation method I was referring to (if it sells them, the money supply decreases). The money is in fact created in the act of buying them (simply by increasing the level of deposits held in the government's treasury account at the central bank). And this money has the property that it increases the reserves on which fractional reserve lending will occur, so the actual change in the money supply will be maybe ten times the amount created by the central bank - although we haven't really discussed how that works.
I understand this can all be a bit confusing.
e2a: and to correct you, the securities are created by the government not the central bank. That's why they are government bonds
The welfare state was far from inevitable. But the UK did need to have a certain prosperity before it could be attempted.Fruitloop said:
You think you can get a welfare state without development, more material resources, a better educated populace? Lots of developing countries are trying it at the moment, using aid money. It's not proving terribly sucessful.
kyser_soze
Hawking's Angry Eyebrow
Fruitloop said:
Can you really separate the two? The mentality of having Welfare State is in part an outgrowth from the vestigal religious limb that informed many of the early Victorian social reformers who were appalled at what they saw in unfettered capitalism of the early industrial period, coupled with early socialists, who were an outgrowth of Bentham and the school of thought that said maximising human happiness is prime in human endeavour. This in turn grew out of basic Christian morality of not allowing the suffering to suffer, which irrespective of what The Church did or said was very much the case on the ground, especially in the gathered Churches and the puritans, who in turn also had ideas that were recognisable as anarchist religious practices (no priestly hierarchy, interdependent communities supporting each other)...
The modern Welfare State is something that combined and systematised all these different strands of 'private' welfare into something controlled and managed by the State.
slaar said:
Well we'd have to define what capitalism is then. And that seems somewhat absurd since surely we operate under the same understanding of the word?
No, thailand is certainly not 'rampantly' capatilist.
As for bangkok, well if you look at its underbelly, it still is grassroots democracy, which to me is not equating to rampant capitalism. You've got the business centre, sure, but most of the city is made up of small communities, as defined by amphurs and tambons. These two words are part of everybody's address and by physical location definable communities.
But in any case, bangkok is not very representative of thailand at all. In terms of politics and economics it is its own centre. It retains control of the whole country. That is thailand's weakness.
And in case it seems this is subsuming the thread, thailand i'm using as an example of a developing nation compared to britain which is most definitely rampantly capitalist in terms of its people's spending habits.
Thailand also has its social security systems in place.
And it most certainly has structures in place to take care of folk who hit hard times. And those structures are independent of the control centre of government. If this all sounds in any way contradictory, then voila, you have thailand!
Surely if we're looking at the welfare state we'd have to say that the nordic countries are more developed in this regard than britain or the US.
And we must surely agree that the UK or US are more rampantly capitalist than norawy, sweden, denmark...?
UK may have more welfare available, via the state, than thailand, but still, its citizens are far bigger spenders, and debtors, than in thailand.
So what gives?
And we must surely agree that the UK or US are more rampantly capitalist than norawy, sweden, denmark...?
UK may have more welfare available, via the state, than thailand, but still, its citizens are far bigger spenders, and debtors, than in thailand.
So what gives?
Totally agree they are. So what?fela fan said:
It's about proportions fela. The UK has more of its economy controlled by the state than Thailand, and by a considerable distance.
Let's draw an analogy. In some ways Thailand now is like the UK in the middle of the 19th century. Lots of people still in rural areas living quite traditional lives, but being sucked into the cities by growing industry.
Now I'd say that the UK in the mid 19th century was more rampantly capitalist than it is today (dark satanic mills etc etc).
So that's my definition.
Even if it was, whats to say that the wroking classes had nothing to do with the advent of that charity? The working classes are never really passive. We are all active, as a condition of existing. And one could say that the capitalist class only exists in relation to the working classes, so any decision of theirs, however "charitable" (read religously motivated) was because of the working classes.
Afterazll, you can't say that it what caused by God
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