Milton Friedman on Socialism and Capitalism

[Abraham]

I prefer our tax dollars going to beach bums than on armaments like nuke weapons that never should be created or used.

Medicare is a form of socialism but it has not sent us broke - it just comes out of the levy that is like everything else paid at a higher rate of tax for high income earners. Under pure capitalism how will Bogan's ticker be subsidised?

Trying a harder strain of Hash than usual?

 

[Abraham]

Maybe we should start digging more holes or [This word has been automatically removed] off some more public assets to pay for it. Energy bills go down when you privatise apparently.

Or maybe we could just stop wasting money on financing over-inflated governments and welfare payments to people who don't need it.

But whatever tickles your fancy.

 

[diedpretty]

Probably a piss take on the crap that BBF stinks the forum up with.

When i saw the topic my first thought was BBF has been out picking magic mushrooms again.

 

[Byron_Bay_Fan]

That's easy to answer. Mum and dad both have to sell a kidney, and if that's not enough then I die before I hit my teens. On the upside, it's one less mouth to feed and now have more disposable income to spend on trickle down economics. Yay capitalism!

Our mate Duterte recently passed a law that hospitals (private that is) must accept emergency patients even if they cannot pay up front in advance - up to then bods were dying in the streets outside hospitals. That's why the guy is still popular.

I am still awaiting Abe's response as to how seriously sick will be cared for. The NDIS could half send us broke if done properly I admit - but society does not allow euthanasia or mercy killing so what can parents do. I have witnessed mother dogs suffocate their sick new born-young if they cannot feed properly. I am in no way referring to you Bongan.

 

[Cultured_Bogan]

Maybe we should start digging more holes or [This word has been automatically removed] off some more public assets to pay for it. Energy bills go down when you privatise apparently.

Or maybe we could just stop wasting money on financing over-inflated governments and welfare payments to people who don't need it.

But whatever tickles your fancy.

Despite my reasonably leftist leanings in regard to social issues Abe, I am a bit further to the right on economic issues. I would like to see the welfare system streamlined and I am not against curbing welfare cheating at all, anyone who chooses not to work when they are more than equipped to are scum bags IMO, however the welfare base is not limited to pot smoking dole bludgers.

There are people whom trying to re-skill to get back into the workforce, people whom have paid taxes their whole lives and get retrenched because this country is becoming a big warehouse. There are people whom are full time carers for significantly disabled people and the elderly. Do you deem those people worthy of our (the taxpayers,) support?

Saying that welfare should be abolished because some exploit it is horrific, and given your staunchly Christian background (at least that's how you appear to project yourself on this forum,) it's a far cry from the morals espoused by your prophet about taking care of one another and the less fortunate.

 

[Geo]

Old Milt was a brilliant man.

Socialism is nothing more than state sponsored theft, its actually an evil system in practice.

Capitalism in its purest form, which unfortunately in not really practiced anywhere in the world today, is the only system that provides equality of opportunity and then leaves it to the individual to determine how successful they will be.

No system is perfect Abe.

I am extremely grateful that Australia has socialised policies. My mechanical aortic valve surgery covered under socialised healthcare here would have cost my parents $600K in the USA. Denying people the right to good health care or education based on the size of their wallet is evil practice IMO.

When your a country as wealthy as Australia, it is immoral to allow people to die in the the streets because they cant afford food or essential medical care.

That i have no problem with.

I do however have a problem with people living their entire lives off the taxpayer's purse due to laziness, and i do have a problem with the Government using our tax dollars as their own personal slush fund to entice people to vote for them again, by way of Family Tax Benefits and hand outs to people who should not be getting them.

Its no coincidence that the more socialist we are becoming, the more in debt the nation becomes. One never comes without the other.

I prefer our tax dollars going to beach bums than on armaments like nuke weapons that never should be created or used.

Medicare is a form of socialism but it has not sent us broke - it just comes out of the levy that is like everything else paid at a higher rate of tax for high income earners. Under pure capitalism how will Bogan's ticker be subsidised?

Australia has Nuclear Weapons now…When dis happen... 😕 😕

 

[Byron_Bay_Fan]

We do have beach bums but not nukes - maybe we can't afford both. I did not state we have nukes but was theorising and internationalising as ethical questions should be universally consistent to prevent discrepancies and to aid universal acceptance. An example the USA is greatly inconsistent in opposing North Korea's nuke weapons program, when it is UN policy that the USA and USSR disarm their weapons decades ago. Israel has nuke weapons but USA does not say BOO about it.

 

[Abraham]

Despite my reasonably leftist leanings in regard to social issues Abe, I am a bit further to the right on economic issues. I would like to see the welfare system streamlined and I am not against curbing welfare cheating at all, anyone who chooses not to work when they are more than equipped to are scum bags IMO, however the welfare base is not limited to pot smoking dole bludgers.

There are people whom trying to re-skill to get back into the workforce, people whom have paid taxes their whole lives and get retrenched because this country is becoming a big warehouse. There are people whom are full time carers for significantly disabled people and the elderly. Do you deem those people worthy of our (the taxpayers,) support?

Saying that welfare should be abolished because some exploit it is horrific, and given your staunchly Christian background (at least that's how you appear to project yourself on this forum,) it's a far cry from the morals espoused by your prophet about taking care of one another and the less fortunate.

In my initial response to you is said it is basically evil for a wealthy country like Australia to let people suffer unnecessarily.

However this government charity should be set aside for those who need it, and not those who just want it.

I don't think there is anything un-Christian about that.

(and BTW Jesus is considered the Messiah in Chrisianity, not a prophet … i can give you a whole book that explains this :stuck_out_tongue: )

 

[Abraham]

I am still awaiting Abe's response as to how seriously sick will be cared for. The NDIS could half send us broke if done properly I admit - but society does not allow euthanasia or mercy killing so what can parents do. I have witnessed mother dogs suffocate their sick new born-young if they cannot feed properly. I am in no way referring to you Bongan.

If you put down the Pipe you will see i already answered this in my response to CB.

After that you said something about Donald Trump, who is a convicted Rapist and Felon, Australian Nukes, and Mumma dogs killing their pups … :crazy

 

[Yossarian]

I'm not convinced they need to be absolutes. You can have a capitalist system with a social welfare system. I don't want Australia to be Venezuela or the USA.

 

[colmcd]

Old Milton was full of BS.

Sorry he just made stuff up.

Remember if you believe Milton, you believe:
that bulk buying is more expensive. because of economies of scale.
Small business will dominate big.
Free trade works and should be done everywhere, regardless of consequence.

Yet we know:
Bulk buying works and it is often cheaper to manufacture in bulk.
Small business gets squashed by big. Mcdonalds and bunnings are dominating.
Free trade creates massive problems between unequal economies (i.e. Chinese workers without overtime vs Australian with proper safety standards.) Adam Smith theorised this in the 1800's when you had city states and restrictive trade between like economies.

Hence why I totally disagree with your statement:

Old Milt was a brilliant man.

Socialism is nothing more than state sponsored theft, its actually an evil system in practice.

Capitalism in its purest form, which unfortunately in not really practiced anywhere in the world today, is the only system that provides equality of opportunity and then leaves it to the individual to determine how successful they will be.

Capitalism is as evil as socialism. There are many alternatives and quite frankly the more we tend to extreme capitalism the more we see how broke it is.

Milton is dogmatic, he is a thinker but does not base his thoughts in real life examples. Life justifies his theories. Economics is not scientific or Mathematically based. Mathematically it is a joke. As capitalism approaches it's extremes it breaks, it is breaking now.

Think again.

Milton Friedman operated in a different era and completely different economic environment than today, so specific examples he spoke of may not apply to 2017, but his overall rationale still does.

Socialism is nothing more than state sponsored theft. Taking from one person who has worked hard, and giving the fruits of their labor to another person who has not worked for it. That my friend is an evil system.

It deals solely with equality of outcome. That's why people are killing their pet dogs for food in Venezuela as we speak.

Did you know that the USA started off as Socialist colony? It lasted all of 5 minutes until people stopped working because the rewards for their output was given away to others who didn't work for it.

Capitalism on the other hand, actual proper capitalism, and not the crony capitalism that has overtaken all western nations at present, it a system that values **equality of opportunity**.

What you do with that opportunity is in your own hands. It is an aspirational system, and is no coincidence that countries like the USA and Australia were seen as lands of opportunities, where people could escape poverty and become successes if they were prepared to work hard.

Only an out and out crazy person would argue the virtues of Socialism (mostly uni students and over the hill hippies, sitting in the comfortable surroundings that capitalism brought them, ironically). I guess the cues of people wanting to immigrate to Venezuala or Cuba are testament to that.

Milton wants to frame the battle as "socialism" vs "capitalism" because he can use your argument to say "extreme socialism sucks compared with my wonderful extreme capitalism.".

You are seeing clear failures in our business world when sensible regulations are taken away. For instance legislation preventing bad loans was removed because this would not allow for "proper capitalism". Then we had the 2008 GFC…. Then the Milton fans comeback and say "no you should have de-regulated it more, it needed to be more proper".

We only have to compare our health care system to the USA to know that a government run health system is better. Did you know it is cheaper too? The USA health system costs more per person then ANY other health system in the world, it's also the most capitalistic in the first world!

If you are making a pizza and it says to add 3 teaspoons of sauce but the sauce taste's bad. Do you keep adding more sauce? Use your thinking skills and not your Dogma, Milton is dodgy.

 

[Cultured_Bogan]

Despite my reasonably leftist leanings in regard to social issues Abe, I am a bit further to the right on economic issues. I would like to see the welfare system streamlined and I am not against curbing welfare cheating at all, anyone who chooses not to work when they are more than equipped to are scum bags IMO, however the welfare base is not limited to pot smoking dole bludgers.

There are people whom trying to re-skill to get back into the workforce, people whom have paid taxes their whole lives and get retrenched because this country is becoming a big warehouse. There are people whom are full time carers for significantly disabled people and the elderly. Do you deem those people worthy of our (the taxpayers,) support?

Saying that welfare should be abolished because some exploit it is horrific, and given your staunchly Christian background (at least that's how you appear to project yourself on this forum,) it's a far cry from the morals espoused by your prophet about taking care of one another and the less fortunate.

In my initial response to you is said it is basically evil for a wealthy country like Australia to let people suffer unnecessarily.

However this government charity should be set aside for those who need it, and not those who just want it.

I don't think there is anything un-Christian about that.

(and BTW Jesus is considered the Messiah in Chrisianity, not a prophet … i can give you a whole book that explains this :stuck_out_tongue: )

OK, as long as you agree that welfare isn't completely redundant I can meet you halfway.

Yes, you're right in that Jesus was the Messiah, the Muslims believe he was the penultimate prophet. It has been about 15-20 years since I last read the Bible, and it's been longer than that that I read it with enthusiasm.

 

[Byron_Bay_Fan]

Despite my reasonably leftist leanings in regard to social issues Abe, I am a bit further to the right on economic issues. I would like to see the welfare system streamlined and I am not against curbing welfare cheating at all, anyone who chooses not to work when they are more than equipped to are scum bags IMO, however the welfare base is not limited to pot smoking dole bludgers.

There are people whom trying to re-skill to get back into the workforce, people whom have paid taxes their whole lives and get retrenched because this country is becoming a big warehouse. There are people whom are full time carers for significantly disabled people and the elderly. Do you deem those people worthy of our (the taxpayers,) support?

Saying that welfare should be abolished because some exploit it is horrific, and given your staunchly Christian background (at least that's how you appear to project yourself on this forum,) it's a far cry from the morals espoused by your prophet about taking care of one another and the less fortunate.

In my initial response to you is said it is basically evil for a wealthy country like Australia to let people suffer unnecessarily.

However this government charity should be set aside for those who need it, and not those who just want it.

I don't think there is anything un-Christian about that.

(and BTW Jesus is considered the Messiah in Chrisianity, not a prophet … i can give you a whole book that explains this :stuck_out_tongue: )

Capitalism and Jesusism are the worse mix. Jesus, whom I don't believe existed, is portrayed as saying: “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

So go and stuff the environment with over population, over production and Abe's big gun is quite okay with the fairy up in the clouds - no wonder the world is in a big mess.

 

[MG1962]

Capitalism and Jesusism are the worse mix. Jesus, whom I don't believe existed, is portrayed as saying: “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

So go and stuff the environment with over population, over production and Abe's big gun is quite okay with the fairy up in the clouds - no wonder the world is in a big mess.

Jesus never said that - It is from the old testament.

If anything, Jesus was the first socialist or hippie, depending on your out look

 

[Tim Sheens]

Maybe some that like such a system should support the chooks or the horses.

 

[MG1962]

LOL there is a reason no country in the world tries to pursue Laissez faire economic policies anymore.

I never advocated Laissez Faire economics.

I advocated Capitalism.

But thanks.

Maybe you could define "Proper Capitalism" then

 

[Tim Sheens]

Maybe we should start digging more holes or [This word has been automatically removed] off some more public assets to pay for it. Energy bills go down when you privatise apparently.

Or maybe we could just stop wasting money on financing over-inflated governments and welfare payments to people who don't need it.

But whatever tickles your fancy.

Despite my reasonably leftist leanings in regard to social issues Abe, I am a bit further to the right on economic issues. I would like to see the welfare system streamlined and I am not against curbing welfare cheating at all, anyone who chooses not to work when they are more than equipped to are scum bags IMO, however the welfare base is not limited to pot smoking dole bludgers.

There are people whom trying to re-skill to get back into the workforce, people whom have paid taxes their whole lives and get retrenched because this country is becoming a big warehouse. There are people whom are full time carers for significantly disabled people and the elderly. Do you deem those people worthy of our (the taxpayers,) support?

Saying that welfare should be abolished because some exploit it is horrific, and given your staunchly Christian background (at least that's how you appear to project yourself on this forum,) it's a far cry from the morals espoused by your prophet about taking care of one another and the less fortunate.

Your last couple of lines are the most important lessons one can get from the religion thing and I was lucky enough to have parents that think the same way, and not religious.

Really find it hard to believe the US repealed the meagre health care legislation that the corporates had fought so hard to oppose, and some think political donations are problem in Australia.

 

[InBenjiWeTrust]

“Sometimes I think that this is an era when sanity has become controversial.” Thomas Sowell

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOMksnSaAJ4

 

[Cultured_Bogan]

Capitalism and Jesusism are the worse mix. Jesus, whom I don't believe existed, is portrayed as saying: “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

So go and stuff the environment with over population, over production and Abe's big gun is quite okay with the fairy up in the clouds - no wonder the world is in a big mess.

Jesus never said that - It is from the old testament.

If anything, Jesus was the first socialist or hippie, depending on your out look

The hilarious thing about Jesus is that if he existed now, the Yanks would have either imprisoned him in Guantanamo Bay or hit him with a drone strike. A socialist Arab, their worst nightmare.

 

[Byron_Bay_Fan]

Capitalism and Jesusism are the worse mix. Jesus, whom I don't believe existed, is portrayed as saying: “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

So go and stuff the environment with over population, over production and Abe's big gun is quite okay with the fairy up in the clouds - no wonder the world is in a big mess.

Jesus never said that - It is from the old testament.

If anything, Jesus was the first socialist or hippie, depending on your out look

The hilarious thing about Jesus is that if he existed now, the Yanks would have either imprisoned him in Guantanamo Bay or hit him with a drone strike. A socialist Arab, their worst nightmare.

Congrats, you have been the first person I have read that would have considered Jesus an Arab, i.e., the Hebrews/ethnic Jews were another tribe of Arabs. (irrelevant if existed or not)