For the anti-capitalists, I have a genuine question (sorry, I couldn’t find an “ask a commie” community):
In the capitalist system there is a movement called Financial Independence Retire Early (FIRE) where people commit to living frugally in an effort to maximize savings and investments. The goal is to achieve a balance that allows you live off a safe withdrawal rate (around 3.5-4%) and then leave the workforce at an earlier than normal age. Some people commit to a life of minimalism and lean-FIRE with under $20k in investment income per year. I believe there is significant overlap with the van-life crowd and other nomadic lifestyles.
Is this lifestyle compatible with, or is there a similar lifestyle within a communist system? To expand, can those with a different set of priorities trade away their later working days in exchange for less material things?
What? There are plenty of communist Lemmy subs you can ask in. I just think you haven’t tried hard enough.
To answer your question tho, no - because there would be no need. Communism does want mandatory participation, but if checked and balanced correctly everyone would work within their limits and not be relegated to a lower class of living - because that’s sort of the point of communism. You’d work within your means until there was time to retire without being limited in access to services and goods. Theoretically, under a functioning communist system, there would be no manufactured scarcity.
Tbh I believe both communism and our current form of capitalism centralises power and ownership way too much. Social-capitalism, or even libertarian socialism, might be the ticket. It would undo at least 200 years of psy-ops and gamed laws designed to favour the rich and vesting power in them, which is the issue of centralised power that we’re facing today - in what some call “late-stage capitalism” - or what I call the breaking point of society under a predatory, exploitative and imperialistic form of capitalism that seems more like the privatisation of the aristocracy than the supposed liberalisation of economy. Transparency, accountability and consequences for people in power and wealth is what’s sorely needed.
PS: New public management is a con-job disguised as decentralisation meant to encumber governments under the guise of checking and balancing them, being effectively a psy-op in of itself to make people hate public services and taxes. As per usual, goddamn liberals - and I include socially conservative liberals in that polifical grouping. Dems and pubs are the same, want the same institutions and promote US imperialism - not fiscal independence, no matter what justification and mental gymnastics they put in the form of spreadsheets.
PPS: Also, additionally, commodification of the housing market was a mistake. It will always be stupid and harmful towards society.
Wow, this one touched some nerves.
I’d recommend posting a tangentially political meme at some point on Lemmy.
The amount of people who will come out of the woodwork to tell you ‘don’t post this’ and ‘don’t make things political’ will really be eye opening.
People don’t want to address systemic issues and think not talking about them is a viable solution.
Just making comments about rich people and their taxes seems to do the same thing here.
Don’t even have to go THAT far, I get called a commie for saying a 40 hour work week should provide basic shelter these days. 🤷
If we want to live in boring reality, it doesn’t happen a LOT but way more than it should.
I mean that was and is a basic communist agitating point, you might be closer to a communist than you think.
I don’t know if this is supposed to be snarky or not but I’ve accepted a while ago that I’m definitely some version of “leftist.”
I don’t see myself that way necessarily but capitalists are drawing their line in the sand so far to the right that it is what it is lmao
It was meant to be snarky as in laughing with you not at you.
I mean… I’m a capitalist who doesn’t defend billionaires and also doesn’t feel left out… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Right? There are pros and cons with every system. People disagree based on value judgements not based on misinterpretation of facts. People in their echo chambers will have you believe that everyone on the other side of the political spectrum all thinks the same way “the same people who say X also say Y!” Rarely is that the case. Most people are actually centrists who have their own independent beliefs on a wide range of topics.
Not everyone on my side of the political Spectrum thinks the same way. But if you are pro capitalist. You simply aren’t thinking. Capital, markets, and currency. All existed before capitalism. The only thing capitalism did was justify the wealth and power of the wealthy and Powerful Beyond being simply born to wealthy powerful people. Now you get to be a wealthy powerful person by having capital. Which ironically just so happens to be most common among people born too powerful people. New boss same as the old boss. Funny how that works.
I hate capitalism, I just don’t know of a better alternative. Nordic socialism is just capitalism with a big government. Soviet socialism failed miserably (it turns out, it is very hard to plan an economy). I have never heard a solid plan for communism that works on a national scale, never mind a plan for transitioning to such a society.
On the other hand, capitalism works reasonably well most of the time and we can just fix issues with it when they crop up (and we have a big backlog of issues to fix).
Capitalism does not work reasonably well most the time. Unchecked it leads to countless busts and Booms that leave the average person destitute. You really should look into the history of the early 20th century. The only reason we even still have capitalism. Is because of two massive world wars. Slaughtering and grinding up many tens of millions of people. As well as passage of basic Social Security nets. We’ve largely at least abandoned the spirit of. If if not in practice as well.
Capitalism has been a failure at every level. Constantly. That isn’t a justification or Praise of leninism. There’s a lot of other ideologies on the Socialist side Beyond leninism. And they don’t require large National level government. Look into them sometime.
Is there any system that is more fair and/or gives you more freedom? I havent found any.
On a hypothetically completely free capitalist market, I can sell and buy whatever I wish and the value that I get when selling directly correlates to the value I’m bringing to the buyer. If I generated a lot of value, I have more capital so I can also buy more value using that capital. Sounds fantastic in theory.
Soviet socialism failed miserably (it turns out, it is very hard to plan an economy).
Did you actually check? Because based on a bunch of metrics I saw the USSR did pretty well compared to the feudalism that came before it and the capitalist “democracy” that came after its illegal and undemocratic dissolution.
If you support capitalism, then yes, you defend billionaires.
Counterpoint: Nope.
So, you support a system that inherently creates an upper class of obscenely rich people, yet are opposed to those people?
A system set up to enrich the owner of a business, while its workers lose out, creates exactly the people you claim not to defend.
No, I’m not opposed to them… I just don’t support them. They can support themselves, and I can support myself just fine. I make more money from them than I would without them, and they make money from me they wouldn’t have otherwise had my skillset to access easily.
I’ve never been forced to take any job… I just manage my skillset in such a way that makes it both rare and valuable. I’ve worn many hats over the years, and I just play the game instead of bitching about the rules Worked out great for me and my family so far. I’ll even have some to leave my kids so they don’t have as hard of a time reaching even higher than I have. That’s the whole point, for me: make my kids’ life better than mine, and I’ve done that so far.
No, I’m not opposed to them… I just don’t support them.
It doesn’t work like that. They are in power, and by not opposing them, you consent to their continued power.
I make more money from them than I would without them,
That isn’t even close to true. Capitalist extraction of surplus value is exactly how they make their profits. If they paid you the value you made them, they wouldn’t have a profit. If they weren’t there to extract that value, you and your fellow workers would make more - it’s basic mathematics.
and they make money from me they wouldn’t have otherwise had my skillset to access easily.
This part is true, yes.
I’ve never been forced to take any job…
So, you’re saying you’re able to retire right now and never work again?
I just play the game instead of bitching about the rules
That’s a slave mindset.
That’s the whole point, for me: make my kids’ life better than mine, and I’ve done that so far.
That’s cool you can think that small and that selfishly. Others, however, realise you could be living even better, and everyone else, including those with nothing, could have that standard of living, too, if we stop being complacent with mere crumbs.
That’s what you have. Mere crumbs of luxury. It’s great that you’re not on the street, but that is an incredibly low standard to have.
If that were the case (which it isnt) I dont see a problem defending billionaires (and on the side also everybody’s freedom and justice)…
You can’t defend billionaires and justice at the same time
Why not? Capitalism is the most fair system to me.
What is the metric for fairness here? And what version of 'capitalism' are we talking about?
Fairness is subjective. To me it means: everyone is free to do what they like WITHOUT invading anybody elses freedom; if a person performs well, they should be rewarded well; everyone should have the same initial possibilities in life.
The version of capitalism I was talking about is capitalism with a regulated market. Basic needs should be covered (except if you refuse to contributr anything at all). Im pretty happy with the “social market economy” in Germany where I currently live.
everyone is free to do what they like WITHOUT invading anybody elses freedom
But how am I gonna get someone to work for me without invading their freedom to choose to do what they want?
Hell no, man. No one will work at my shop if they’re allowed to do what they want.
Basic needs should be covered (except if you refuse to contributr anything at all).
Fuck yeah man! That’s how we do it! That’s what gets people working for me - the threat that not doing so will put ‘em on the street! That’s what I’m talkin’ about!
So everybody on Lemmy is non-capitalist is what you’re saying?
A large proportion of Lemmy are not pro-capitalist, yes.
Thats still very much generalizing. What this meme essentially says is that if you’re a capitalist, you’re not part of Lemmy.
On a seperate note, you cant possibly know how many people on Lemmy actually support capitalism or not. It has a left tendency, yes, but I bet the majority of Lemmx users do support caputalidm in some shape or form.
Does anyone here own capital? As in being haut bourgeoisie? Probably not.
If you support capitalism and you’re not a capitalist you’re just a bootlicker.
And you live on your own self-sustaining compound, posting from your open hardware, fabricated in free factories, Libre software OS and applications, with compost-generated power? Didn’t think so. Welcome to the gray zone bootlicker.
Does anyone here own capital? As in being haut bourgeoisie? Probably not.
If you support capitalism and you’re not a capitalist you’re just a bootlicker.
Yes, I probably have assets valued at .5-1M that I’ve accumulated with my family.
Okay, that at most makes you petite bourgeoisie not haut bourgeoisie. But I’m guessing you can’t live off of your passive income so you’re still proletariat. You have more in common with the proletariat than not, and you have more to gain by overthrowing capitalism then preserving it.
👌👍
Keep moving those goal posts.
Yes, the goal posts of definitions created by a guy who has been dead for more than 100 years. Clarifying a misunderstanding on a basic concept of Marxist analysis of capitalism written more than 100 years ago is moving the goalposts.
Also, can you live entirely off your passive income? If not, youre not even petite bourgeoisie.
You wouldn’t be any better off on a socialist system. The people at the top of the party would control everything and the working class would be even poorer than they are now. You’re just licking the left boot instead of the right one.
This is empirically untrue, but also just nonsense. Politicians do not have the same class relationship as capitalists with the proletariat.
Oh I’m sorry i didn’t realize there was empirical evidence for socialism. Please send me a link to some of these successful socialist societies.
Cuba, Vietnam, and Laos for starters China went from a century of humiliation to a superpower in less then a century thanks to socialism. The USSR was better than the feudalism before it or the dictatorships of the bourgeoisie that came after it by a wide margin. For a place much poorer than the US, they had similar nutrition, better education, more rights for women both legalistically and practically.
Oh, throw in east Germany too. Do you know what the Stasi did to the lgbt movement that they saw as subversive? Destroy it by ending discrimination against gay and trans people, including a massive education campaign to eradicate homophobia and transphobia and state funded gay bars. Compare that to how the US was treating gay people at the time.
Dang, for a moment I considered that you might have independent thoughts. This LemmtGradChatGPT BS ruined it.
These capitalist and billionaire cocksuckers sure love socialism when they socialise their losses and fucking take our tax payer money to bail themselves out. if you’re working class and don’t support socialism, you should look into it more. Propaganda from these blood sucking billionaire ghouls have made most of us blind to the better life socialism can offer us.
That isnt socialism, thats the capitalist state doing its job of protecting capital. Socialism is when the proletariat own the means of production.
Yes i agree. Just pointing out the fact there’s no free market. When they lose, they still win by taking our hard earned money and using it to further their interests. I’d be happier if it were used for our welfare instead.
