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techstepgenr8tion
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01 Nov 2011, 12:28 pm

peebo - let me ask you then; does capitalism make the most of a crap human condition or do you instead subscribe to the idea that capitalism is what makes us this way not the other way around?


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01 Nov 2011, 12:46 pm

Peebo wrote:
the fact that you are asking for evidence of this suggests that you do not live in the uk

Baseless speculation used in an ad hominem way.

Peebo wrote:
as claimants are migrated from incapacity benefit and income support to employment support allowance, they are sent to a mandatory tribunal, where the majority of them are being stripped of their disability related benefits and forced to go through lengthy and stressful appeals to have them reinstated

This is disgusting! I'd like to see proof of this though. Also last time I checked this isn't opression of the proletariat like you have been going on about.

Peebo wrote:
forcing someone with, for instance, long term, enduring, mental health problems, who might have problems even going out of the house, to sit in front of a doctor, who is answering multiple choice questions on a computer with no recourse to use his own discretionary judgement, with the view to sending the person a letter saying they do not qualify for disability related benefits, thus forcing them to go through a lengthy appeal process, all the while worrying about their ability to carry on in life, is indeed penal.

And now we work from an argument of choice reassembly. I doubt that all disabled people are this way at all and if any were I doubt they would be on disability benefit. I think they'd be in an institution. Furthermore you have to try and speculate about what might be going on in their lives to make a point.
And then you go and say that they don't qualify because you say so. I know about this. It's ATOS. Not every company is Atos. :/ And furthermore disabled people aren't the workers.

peebo wrote:
the fact is that the vast majority of workers do not earn hundreds of thousands. and you clearly don't understand the word "praxis".

I dont understand Praxis because... because... Because you say so. Fantastic job. And I am saying that the communist conception of capitalism is based on a completely false premise.

peebo wrote:
you were talking about rights, so unequal bargaining power is certainly something relevant to bring into the discussion.

That is a complete load of utopia. Whether it favours workers or managers or even the damned top brass bargaining power will always favour someone. I'd just prefer a good wage, a perk or two and no industrial strife thanks. Voicing your opinion is a right. protest is a right. Life is a right. Liberty is a right. That covers this already.

peebo wrote:
your point of view is completely skewed towards capitalism. of course the point i am arguing won't equate with capitalist logic, since capitalism relies on wage slavery under the guise of choice.

That is disgustingly self-centred and doesn't explain why I am wrong at all. It is just an ad hominem attack that is explained by using an ad hominem attack. Why don't you actually use reason about why you think I am wrong?

Gedrene wrote:
Workers can't be paid a share according to their 'input' because first: Nobody would make any profit and all economic growth and progress would stall without saving. Second managers play an important part in organising labour that means that in the end they contribute more to the final profit than workers do. It is also an oblivious fantasy because it tries to equate worker's input with wages when in fact many things have input in both direct and indirect ways.


Gedrene wrote:
innovative enough for what? we do not need "entrepreneurial skills". we need meaningful existence

And innovation leads to a meaningful existence. You propose a system of wages that completely ignores the importance of management and entrepreneurs and try to use a pricing system that wont lead to profit, advancement and thus a meaningful existence.

peebo wrote:
life expectancy for those living in the poorest area of glasgow is 25 years shorter than that of those living in the wealthiest.

That's probably partly down to poor diet from overeating for a start, and alcohol intake. No offence but poorer people tend to eat unhealthy food and drink more alcohol than the rich. Furthermore this isn't DEATH FROM STARVATION. You said people in minimum wage struggle to survive. Your argument has already died and you're trying to ignore it.

peebo wrote:

why? did you present any evidence whatsoever that poor people live in bigger houses? your arguments are laughable.

Two wrongs don't make a right. So what you say is crap even before I disprove it.

http://thebarrowboy.files.wordpress.com ... family.jpg
This is an east end family from 1912. An average one. As one can see the setting is more like a barn.
I live next door to crawley and in crawley I can see what is relative poverty. I tell you what. They look far from as bad as these people. These poor would have likely to have been able to get their own house. They might have lived with another family. They don't seem properly dressed. The man's face looks harassed. It's a sight to melt your heart. It also isn't the state of the British poor today. You tried to talk about overty today as if you were saying like it was yesterday. Wage slavery. That's complete rubbish. The poor have become less poor.

Peebo wrote:
You haven't found what interesting?

You can't read. I said arguing with you is interesting because it's different.

Peebo wrote:
your arguments are nonsense, you are asking me to quote studies when i reply to your spurious claims that you have in no way backed up.

They're nonsense because you say so. So in denial again? Anyways I ask you to quote studies because you are making the points. Your only way of disproving was either to say that only a capitalist would think that, a remark I resent because I don't care about capitalism, I care about what works. Your other excuse basically amounted to two wrongs make a right.
Then what do you say? You say that I don't back up anything despite the fact that you only provided one link and that only said what was happening. In order to say it was cruel you had to invent some speculative fiction whereby you spoke about a person with all sorts of characteristics and issues that aren't necessary to be called disabled. Not that this has anything to do with the absurd labour theory of value. It's absurd to believe that manual labour is the only consideration with pricing. It's also a fiction.

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01 Nov 2011, 12:47 pm

visagrunt wrote:
peebo wrote:
this is not relevant. because it is framed within the capitalist paradigm. a society in which people are not wage slaves cannot be built upon investment and accumulation of capital.


Of course it's relevant, because it is the world in which people currently work.

No amount of counting angels on pinheads will create a socialist utopia. But the intelligent, earnest work of socialists can effect positive change inside the capitalist paradigm.

Eventually we'll advance to a point where we can hold the means of production will be able to be held in our hands and then boom! Socialist utopia. But it wont be a socialist utopia. It'll be a post-scarcity wonderland.



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01 Nov 2011, 1:16 pm

visagrunt wrote:
peebo wrote:
this is not relevant. because it is framed within the capitalist paradigm. a society in which people are not wage slaves cannot be built upon investment and accumulation of capital.


Of course it's relevant, because it is the world in which people currently work.

No amount of counting angels on pinheads will create a socialist utopia. But the intelligent, earnest work of socialists can effect positive change inside the capitalist paradigm.



it's not relevant as to the question "does work = slavery". it either does or it doesn't. the kind of system of social organisation in which the worker lives does not in any way change the question. what you are doing is inventing sets of mitigating circumstances that might appear to make it seem less like work = slavery. but you are not really challenging the question at all.


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01 Nov 2011, 1:19 pm

techstepgenr8tion wrote:
peebo - let me ask you then; does capitalism make the most of a crap human condition or do you instead subscribe to the idea that capitalism is what makes us this way not the other way around?


it's maybe not quite so black and white. however, i don't think capitalism makes the most out of a crap human condition. not in any way. perhaps it makes life for the few better at the expense of the many. the human condition experienced by the majority in the current global milieu is certainly the product of capitalism.


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01 Nov 2011, 1:25 pm

peebo wrote:
techstepgenr8tion wrote:
peebo - let me ask you then; does capitalism make the most of a crap human condition or do you instead subscribe to the idea that capitalism is what makes us this way not the other way around?


it's maybe not quite so black and white. however, i don't think capitalism makes the most out of a crap human condition. not in any way. perhaps it makes life for the few better at the expense of the many. the human condition experienced by the majority in the current global milieu is certainly the product of capitalism.

The fact is that in any system people try to be jerks and misuses a system to their advantage. It's up to the rest of society to deal with them. Considering that the poor in the UK are probably better off that the poor in china I'd say a free market system wary of abuses is the best way. Communism as it has been called in nearly all cases has led to either cases of democide or Human Rights abuses on a vast scale, poverty and ultimately an entrenched inequality. Why> Because it is utopian in theory in many places.



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01 Nov 2011, 1:46 pm

peebo wrote:
techstepgenr8tion wrote:
peebo - let me ask you then; does capitalism make the most of a crap human condition or do you instead subscribe to the idea that capitalism is what makes us this way not the other way around?


it's maybe not quite so black and white. however, i don't think capitalism makes the most out of a crap human condition. not in any way. perhaps it makes life for the few better at the expense of the many. the human condition experienced by the majority in the current global milieu is certainly the product of capitalism.
To put a creative thinking exercise to that, if capitalism had never happened and we had an entirely different economic system in its stead, what would the be if it were to offer a better world? How would that work? What do you think the present state of innovation would be in that alternate circumstance?


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01 Nov 2011, 1:53 pm

peebo wrote:
it's not relevant as to the question "does work = slavery". it either does or it doesn't. the kind of system of social organisation in which the worker lives does not in any way change the question. what you are doing is inventing sets of mitigating circumstances that might appear to make it seem less like work = slavery. but you are not really challenging the question at all.


peebo wrote:
it's maybe not quite so black and white. however, i don't think capitalism makes the most out of a crap human condition. not in any way. perhaps it makes life for the few better at the expense of the many. the human condition experienced by the majority in the current global milieu is certainly the product of capitalism.


So, when it's your assertion, it's a binary state. But when it's someone else's assertion, things might not be so black and white.

This strikes me as intellectual hypocrisy of the laziest kind.

I am perfectly prepared to agree that people have been exploited--sometimes most cruelly--in the workplace. But I am not prepared to reduce these cases down to an uncritical, intellectually stilted assertion that employment is the logical equivalent of slavery.

When you are prepared to join me in the real world and work for meaningful workplace protections, the constitutional protection of the right to collective bargaining, and other substantive legal protections for workers, than you and I can have a meeting of the minds.


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techstepgenr8tion
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01 Nov 2011, 1:55 pm

Gedrene wrote:
The fact is that in any system people try to be jerks and misuses a system to their advantage. It's up to the rest of society to deal with them. Considering that the poor in the UK are probably better off that the poor in china I'd say a free market system wary of abuses is the best way. Communism as it has been called in nearly all cases has led to either cases of democide or Human Rights abuses on a vast scale, poverty and ultimately an entrenched inequality. Why> Because it is utopian in theory in many places.
I saw on a panel that they were discussing OWS and one of the interviewees they had on video was a college girl who said that she didn't like the concept of corporate personhood. Charles Krauthammer mentioned that he found that particular comment comical in that, in China, 350 million people were lifted out of abject poverty by China's acceptance of corporate personhood in the 1980's and that it was the biggest chunk that any one thing had ever taken out of global poverty. I suppose that's not to say that industrializing the developing world country by country would be a panacea but it definitely shows what people can do when they're adding more value to their system than having the majority of their populous tied up in sustainance farming.

Also, back to Peebo's point earlier about capitalism making the few and breaking the many; if he's truly speaking in a global sense I think he'd have a better argument with 'colonialism' as that would make more sense from that perspective. Kind of like a square is a rectangle but a rectangle isn't necessarily a square - colonialism could (and did) happen under a very barbaric and underdeveloped version of capitalism but capitalism still isn't so restricted that it would even need to include that. I tend to agree with visagrunt as well - the people involved in capitalism are what also can tip its quality either toward more malignant or more benevolent, based on the pressures they place on it. Socialism/communism unfortunately aren't so adaptive that you can make of them what you wish.


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01 Nov 2011, 3:21 pm

techstepgenr8tion wrote:
I saw on a panel that they were discussing OWS and one of the interviewees they had on video was a college girl who said that she didn't like the concept of corporate personhood.


I agree. There ought to be a saner way of limiting liability than pretending a group of people is a person.

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01 Nov 2011, 4:43 pm

Gedrene wrote:
Peebo wrote:
the fact that you are asking for evidence of this suggests that you do not live in the uk

Baseless speculation used in an ad hominem way.


not at all. most of the people i come across and have cause to discuss this major issue that is affecting millions in the uk at present, in addition to those who read newspapers, are well aware of this.

it is not speculation at all. it is a big issue in the uk at the moment. and neither is it used in an ad hominem way. i simply made a suggestion about your country of residence.

Quote:
Peebo wrote:
as claimants are migrated from incapacity benefit and income support to employment support allowance, they are sent to a mandatory tribunal, where the majority of them are being stripped of their disability related benefits and forced to go through lengthy and stressful appeals to have them reinstated

This is disgusting! I'd like to see proof of this though. Also last time I checked this isn't opression of the proletariat like you have been going on about.


proof:
http://www.disabilityalliance.org/ibmigrate.htm

it's clearly a penal policy being used against the poor. describe it as you see fit. regardless, the discussion drifted onto this.


Peebo wrote:
forcing someone with, for instance, long term, enduring, mental health problems, who might have problems even going out of the house, to sit in front of a doctor, who is answering multiple choice questions on a computer with no recourse to use his own discretionary judgement, with the view to sending the person a letter saying they do not qualify for disability related benefits, thus forcing them to go through a lengthy appeal process, all the while worrying about their ability to carry on in life, is indeed penal.

Quote:
And now we work from an argument of choice reassembly.


i have no idea what you mean by this.

Quote:
I doubt that all disabled people are this way at all and if any were I doubt they would be on disability benefit. I think they'd be in an institution.


then you are betraying your general lack of knowledge in the area. firstly, we don't really have institutions anymore, other than for "mentally disordered offenders". have you never heard of care in the community? it's been a fact for quite a long time. besides, people in psychiatric hospitals, even long term in-patients, generally ARE on disability benefits.

Quote:
Furthermore you have to try and speculate about what might be going on in their lives to make a point.


no i don't. i work with people every day who are in such situations as outlined above. there is no speculation.


Quote:
And then you go and say that they don't qualify because you say so. I know about this. It's ATOS. Not every company is Atos. :/ And furthermore disabled people aren't the workers.


what do you mean, i say so? i don't say who qualifies for benefits or who doesn't. you just need to look at the statistics. i've been looking around for a page clearly outlining this but the most accurate information is to be found on rightsnet, a subscription website run for people working in the area of welfare rights. the following article is not available without a subscription, and i can't post it here, however the headline, available on the front page of the site, says it all really:
rightsnet.org.uk wrote:
62 per cent of completed work capability assessments find claimant ‘fit for work’
New statistics also show that 39 per cent of those found fit for work have had appeal heard by tribunal and that 38 per cent of those appeals successful
26 October, 2011


here is a recent guardian article discussing the issue in more general terms

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011 ... y-benefits

as for atos, they are the company that oversee benefit tribunals, and who built the computer system that is used to make decisions.


as for disabled people not being workers, as i said, the discussion has drifted onto the benefits system after you brought it up. the benefit system is in no way any kind of real safety net for people who are out of work or those who can't work. it is, in effect, a penal system.



Quote:
peebo wrote:
the fact is that the vast majority of workers do not earn hundreds of thousands. and you clearly don't understand the word "praxis".

I dont understand Praxis because... because... Because you say so. Fantastic job. And I am saying that the communist conception of capitalism is based on a completely false premise.


can you outline what this false premise is, please?

peebo wrote:
peebo"]you were talking about rights, so unequal bargaining power is certainly something relevant to bring into the discussion.

That is a complete load of utopia. Whether it favours workers or managers or even the damned top brass bargaining power will always favour someone. I'd just prefer a good wage, a perk or two and no industrial strife thanks. Voicing your opinion is a right. protest is a right. Life is a right. Liberty is a right. That covers this already.[/quote]

the opinions of the poor are ignored. if they protest, they are demonised. look at the difference in reactions between the student riots and the more recent rioting. and neither do the masses of low paid workers have liberty.

Quote:
peebo wrote:
your point of view is completely skewed towards capitalism. of course the point i am arguing won't equate with capitalist logic, since capitalism relies on wage slavery under the guise of choice.

That is disgustingly self-centred and doesn't explain why I am wrong at all. It is just an ad hominem attack that is explained by using an ad hominem attack. Why don't you actually use reason about why you think I am wrong?


it is not in any way an ad hominem attack. it appears you don't really understand the meaning of ad hominem, either.


Quote:
Gedrene wrote:
Workers can't be paid a share according to their 'input' because first: Nobody would make any profit and all economic growth and progress would stall without saving. Second managers play an important part in organising labour that means that in the end they contribute more to the final profit than workers do. It is also an oblivious fantasy because it tries to equate worker's input with wages when in fact many things have input in both direct and indirect ways.


Quote:
innovative enough for what? we do not need "entrepreneurial skills". we need meaningful existence

And innovation leads to a meaningful existence. You propose a system of wages that completely ignores the importance of management and entrepreneurs and try to use a pricing system that wont lead to profit, advancement and thus a meaningful existence.[/'quote]

why do you assume that human beings can be motivated by nothing other than money and advancing their status over others?

Quote:
peebo wrote:
life expectancy for those living in the poorest area of glasgow is 25 years shorter than that of those living in the wealthiest.

That's probably partly down to poor diet from overeating for a start, and alcohol intake. No offence but poorer people tend to eat unhealthy food and drink more alcohol than the rich. Furthermore this isn't DEATH FROM STARVATION. You said people in minimum wage struggle to survive. Your argument has already died and you're trying to ignore it.


your argument has unfortunately descended to bigoted nonsense. no offence??


Quote:
peebo wrote:
why? did you present any evidence whatsoever that poor people live in bigger houses? your arguments are laughable.

Two wrongs don't make a right. So what you say is crap even before I disprove it.[/quote

the point is, you haven't proven or disproved anything. you post unsubstantiated nonsense, and when i counter it with the actual reality of the situation, you demand proof? are you for real?

Quote:
http://thebarrowboy.files.wordpress.com ... family.jpg
This is an east end family from 1912. An average one. As one can see the setting is more like a barn.
I live next door to crawley and in crawley I can see what is relative poverty. I tell you what. They look far from as bad as these people. These poor would have likely to have been able to get their own house. They might have lived with another family. They don't seem properly dressed. The man's face looks harassed. It's a sight to melt your heart. It also isn't the state of the British poor today. You tried to talk about overty today as if you were saying like it was yesterday. Wage slavery. That's complete rubbish. The poor have become less poor.


unfortunately this is a ridiculous argument. you have to consider relativity.

see here http://www.poverty.org.uk/summary/socia ... sion.shtml

of course things were worse for the poor in the uk in 1912. that doesn't mean that poverty no longer exists. and regardless, it's not necessarily relevant to the original argument anyway.


Quote:
Peebo wrote:
You haven't found what interesting?

You can't read. I said arguing with you is interesting because it's different.


fair enough, i must have misunderstood you.

Quote:
Peebo wrote:
your arguments are nonsense, you are asking me to quote studies when i reply to your spurious claims that you have in no way backed up.

They're nonsense because you say so. So in denial again? Anyways I ask you to quote studies because you are making the points. Your only way of disproving was either to say that only a capitalist would think that, a remark I resent because I don't care about capitalism, I care about what works. Your other excuse basically amounted to two wrongs make a right.


firstly, i'm not arguing that two wrongs make a right. you attempted to make the patently absurd absolute claim that poor people live in bigger houses today than they did in the 1960s. this is clearly wrong. it's perhaps not easy to prove with statistics, i don't know where i would find them for a start, but i can assure you that it is wrong.

after i counter your patently absurd and unsubstantiated claim, you then ask me to provide proof. do you see the flaw here??


Quote:
Then what do you say? You say that I don't back up anything despite the fact that you only provided one link and that only said what was happening. In order to say it was cruel you had to invent some speculative fiction whereby you spoke about a person with all sorts of characteristics and issues that aren't necessary to be called disabled. Not that this has anything to do with the absurd labour theory of value. It's absurd to believe that manual labour is the only consideration with pricing. It's also a fiction.


ok.


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01 Nov 2011, 4:48 pm

techstepgenr8tion wrote:

Also, back to Peebo's point earlier about capitalism making the few and breaking the many; if he's truly speaking in a global sense I think he'd have a better argument with 'colonialism' as that would make more sense from that perspective. Kind of like a square is a rectangle but a rectangle isn't necessarily a square - colonialism could (and did) happen under a very barbaric and underdeveloped version of capitalism but capitalism still isn't so restricted that it would even need to include that. I tend to agree with visagrunt as well - the people involved in capitalism are what also can tip its quality either toward more malignant or more benevolent, based on the pressures they place on it. Socialism/communism unfortunately aren't so adaptive that you can make of them what you wish.



the point here is that the neo-liberal globalist model of capitalism is simply the logical conclusion of colonialism. i feel this is self evident and doesn't require much further explanation, but there has been much written on it, at great length. if you would like me to point out some links i'd be happy to.


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01 Nov 2011, 5:02 pm

One could assert that wage-earners are not forced to work, and therefore are not slaves, but one could just as easily assert that slaves are not forced to be slaves, the alternatives being running away, or suicide, which are, in some ways, the same thing. Wage-earners are made to be as dependent upon their 'masters' as slaves were upon theirs. Yes, you may leave. But where will you go, and on what will you subsist? Even if you want to go live in the forest and collect wild berries and roots and such, you can't, because someone else owns the land. There is no 'free land' as far as I know. So, one is forced to work, if one does not wish to be jailed. In a sense, one must resign oneself to one sort of jail in order to avoid another. When one asserts that wage-earners are not forced to work and be subservient to a 'master', can one also provide reasonable alternatives to this so-called 'choice'? Because as far as I can see, the only alternative is to break one or more laws.


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01 Nov 2011, 5:10 pm

peebo wrote:
the point here is that the neo-liberal globalist model of capitalism is simply the logical conclusion of colonialism. i feel this is self evident and doesn't require much further explanation, but there has been much written on it, at great length. if you would like me to point out some links i'd be happy to.

They had Mike Kantor on a CSPAN'ish channel and were grilling him a bit on NAFTA as a lot of people feel like that and the global free trade agreement later did a lot of damage to our economy. His stance was that pre-NAFTA business were already talking about doing this, by the mid-80's, and that the whole purpose was to make sure that the process was regulated rather than unregulated (a bit of the 'give kids condoms' type logic). I know economists scream bloody murder if you suggest tariffs and the net result of globalization seems to be the lesser of two evils from that standpoint.

On one side China's costs are starting to increase and as that's happening their practice of undervaluing their currency is getting more and more conspicuous. Seems like Asia will be getting to the point though where it just won't be practical and a lot of this stuff will be coming back to our shores, though I get the impression that by the time it does so much more of it will be robotic - the minute China stops feeling like quite as much of an investment the unions ratchet up their demands over here and put the Chinese factories a little bit closer to the green again.

The thing I would have to argue though - I've heard it said before by people and it seems like, at *least* within the first world, income-wise yes, the rich get richer, the middle-class get richer but at maybe a 1/3 to 1/2 pace with the rich, and the poor get richer but by only 1/3 to 1/2 the pace of the middle class; hence yes, the income inequality gaps are widening although they're trending upward for those who aren't in the bottom 10% where they stay the same (and none of this is counting technological innovation and what that does for all). As far as the third world is concerned though you do have major charities attempting to do work, you do have things like the Gates Foundation, which both Bill and Warren will be giving their entirety to, and within the next twenty years if our manufacturing of infrastructure type items strengthens it means that our ability to actually even GIVE Africa or remote parts of Asia infrastructure or technology to unfold it in a couple decades, such actions on our part will be within our means to give thanks to the march of technology; something which is, while not on a personal level but on an economic/societal one, is elevated by capitalism in ways that it couldn't as easily be under a pure egalitarian system.

We can also look at the original act of colonialism and the acts of barbarism that were carried out by the big five empire builders at the time and see that yes, we treated people terribly back then. The only question though is; would these places without outside influence be much more advanced of their own action or would they be indiscernible from what they were in 1000 AD, 2000 BC, etc.? I'll never say that colonialism was a great thing but we may be fantasizing, more than a little, to assume that they'd be first world countries or anything close without it either. In an anthropology sense it seems like groups of people flip culture or move forward when things aren't practical anymore. Same reason the Europeans out-teched everyone would be the same reason Filipino morrow could hand anyone their head in hand to hand combat - the environment and pool of influences lent that reality. A lot of it is climate, a lot of it is geography, the prevailing local religious mythology plays a big role as well.


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02 Nov 2011, 1:20 am

MarsCoban wrote:
One could assert that wage-earners are not forced to work, and therefore are not slaves, but one could just as easily assert that slaves are not forced to be slaves, the alternatives being running away, or suicide, which are, in some ways, the same thing. Wage-earners are made to be as dependent upon their 'masters' as slaves were upon theirs. Yes, you may leave. But where will you go, and on what will you subsist? Even if you want to go live in the forest and collect wild berries and roots and such, you can't, because someone else owns the land. There is no 'free land' as far as I know. So, one is forced to work, if one does not wish to be jailed. In a sense, one must resign oneself to one sort of jail in order to avoid another. When one asserts that wage-earners are not forced to work and be subservient to a 'master', can one also provide reasonable alternatives to this so-called 'choice'? Because as far as I can see, the only alternative is to break one or more laws.


well put.


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02 Nov 2011, 2:26 am

techstepgenr8tion wrote:
The thing I would have to argue though - I've heard it said before by people and it seems like, at *least* within the first world, income-wise yes, the rich get richer, the middle-class get richer but at maybe a 1/3 to 1/2 pace with the rich, and the poor get richer but by only 1/3 to 1/2 the pace of the middle class; hence yes, the income inequality gaps are widening although they're trending upward for those who aren't in the bottom 10% where they stay the same (and none of this is counting technological innovation and what that does for all).



but this is not necessarily the case. recent reports have actually found that in real terms, in the uk at least, those earning around the minimum wage and on benefits are actually worse of now than they were a decade ago:

http://www.socialequality.org.uk/~sepuk/content/britain’s-rowntree-foundation-poor-are-getting-poorer

Donald Hirsch, Head of Income Studies at the Centre for Research in Social Policy, Loughborough University, who co-authored the Rowntree report wrote:
This new research underlines how people living close to the minimum income standard can end up not having enough if economic trends start going against them. For example, a single person who a decade ago had just enough to get by, and whose income has risen in line with official inflation, cannot afford a minimum budget today. Big rises in the prices of things like food and council tax means that they are nearly £20 a week short of what they need, and must think of what essentials they will go without.


in addition to this, the general trend is that relative poverty is increasing yearly.

Quote:
As far as the third world is concerned though you do have major charities attempting to do work, you do have things like the Gates Foundation, which both Bill and Warren will be giving their entirety to, and within the next twenty years if our manufacturing of infrastructure type items strengthens it means that our ability to actually even GIVE Africa or remote parts of Asia infrastructure or technology to unfold it in a couple decades, such actions on our part will be within our means to give thanks to the march of technology; something which is, while not on a personal level but on an economic/societal one, is elevated by capitalism in ways that it couldn't as easily be under a pure egalitarian system.



the problem with this is that the problems the third world nations are facing are, in reality, a consequence of neocolonial/neoliberal intervention. the activities of the imf, the world bank and multinational corporations are not at all in the interests of the general populations of these nations. rather, they are in the interests of furthering the neoliberal agenda. they are driven by corporate profit, and are in no way benevolent. third world nations need to be self-sufficient, the propping up of corrupt regimes and selling off of assets and resources to the ruling classes is not in any way in their best interests. rather, it further increases the quandary that such nations find themselves in.

this report, using copper mining in zambia as an example, is a case in point, and fairly.

http://www.actsa.org/Pictures/UpImages/ ... report.pdf


additionally, i think it is imprudent to cite examples of the activities of the most hideously wealthy of the western elites. organisations such as the gates foundation exist to further an agenda in which those in control of such organisations have a clear vested interest.

see, for example, this analysis of their activities in africa:

this report, using copper mining in zambia as an example, is a case in point, and fairly.

http://www.actsa.org/Pictures/UpImages/ ... report.pdf

Quote:
We can also look at the original act of colonialism and the acts of barbarism that were carried out by the big five empire builders at the time and see that yes, we treated people terribly back then. The only question though is; would these places without outside influence be much more advanced of their own action or would they be indiscernible from what they were in 1000 AD, 2000 BC, etc.? I'll never say that colonialism was a great thing but we may be fantasizing, more than a little, to assume that they'd be first world countries or anything close without it either. In an anthropology sense it seems like groups of people flip culture or move forward when things aren't practical anymore. Same reason the Europeans out-teched everyone would be the same reason Filipino morrow could hand anyone their head in hand to hand combat - the environment and pool of influences lent that reality. A lot of it is climate, a lot of it is geography, the prevailing local religious mythology plays a big role as well.


i don't think anyone is arguing that these nations would be first world countries, and indeed this is not really the point. the point is that what is happening there today is nothing more than colonialism operating under the guise capitalist globalisation. the lot of workers in the third world has not been improved by neoliberal intervention, and indeed neoliberal intervention is not in any way benevolent. it is purely agenda driven.


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Adam Smith