begin_within
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Fri Sep-18-09 11:07 PM
Original message |
Sorry dumb question. If the ruling class wants capitalism to survive, |
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why don't they fix it! Why are they letting it run on fumes and drift into a ditch. The people with the money are the ones with the real power to get the economic apparatus up and running again, and they are the ones that benefit the most when it is running. So why are they just letting the engine of captialism, the economic apparatus of the U.S., to just idle and sputter?
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armyowalgreens
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Fri Sep-18-09 11:14 PM
Response to Original message |
1. Because the ruling class is made up of a bunch of greedy idiots. |
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They aren't mad scientists out of sci-fi movies.
They are morons that happened upon shit loads of money in a myriad of accidental and lucky ways.
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bertman
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Fri Sep-18-09 11:39 PM
Response to Reply #1 |
7. I think you are grossly underestimating the intelligence and drive needed to amass a great |
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fortune, armyowalgreens. Morons do not become super-rich. Smart, clever, ruthless, greedy people do.
And, of course, the lucky ones who come up with a great invention at the perfect time qualify for your list.
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LostInAnomie
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Fri Sep-18-09 11:43 PM
Response to Reply #7 |
9. Or, they are born into it. |
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The majority the 500 richest people in the world were born into it.
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bertman
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Sat Sep-19-09 10:01 AM
Response to Reply #9 |
16. If they aren't smart enough to hire people who are skilled or ruthless enough to protect |
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their interests, they won't be in the Top 500 for long. A stupid rich person is the biggest target in the world for those who feast on the remains of dumb rich folks.
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armyowalgreens
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Sat Sep-19-09 01:20 AM
Response to Reply #7 |
11. I doesn't necessarily take that much brains to steal vast amounts of money. |
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Probably a basic understanding of economics and a complete lack of a moral compass.
As we can see, there a many titans of industry that successfully ran their companies into the ground.
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bertman
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Sat Sep-19-09 09:59 AM
Response to Reply #11 |
15. It takes intelligence and other attributes to be able to get to the top of the heap so one |
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can run a company into the ground.
It also takes a certain amount of smarts to be able to run a company (or a nation's economy) into the ground, and still walk away with all the money you stole--while someone else foots the bill.
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Fumesucker
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Sat Sep-19-09 10:29 AM
Response to Reply #7 |
19. Eh, look at Wolf Blitzer's recent performance on Jeopardy.. |
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The guy really isn't all that bright or educated and yet he is at the top of the heap in the M$M and making millions.
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Quantess
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Fri Sep-18-09 11:18 PM
Response to Original message |
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No time to "fix" anything, except to "fix" ways to make government allow the greedy bastards to get more and more.
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lib2DaBone
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Fri Sep-18-09 11:23 PM
Response to Original message |
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I have asked the same question many times.. as I'm sure many DU'ers have.
Answer: The Corporations control everyting... media, jobs, dialog, economy,solutions, EVERYTHING!
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angrycarpenter
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Fri Sep-18-09 11:25 PM
Response to Original message |
4. Look at the stock listings. |
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Behind every stock is a board that is scared to death that the price might fall. Stockholders care little for anything except the performance of the stocks they hold. Boards care little except getting through the next quarter. There is zero regard for the future, no one is looking any farther ahead than three months. Wall street and it's stockholders have us all by the balls and it seems to be the only economy that matters any more. To them fixing things just means finding another racket.
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Odin2005
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Fri Sep-18-09 11:27 PM
Response to Original message |
5. Because there is no giant conspiracy, just individuals being greedy, power-hungry morans. |
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I mostly disagree with Marx, but that aspect he got totally right.
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LostInAnomie
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Fri Sep-18-09 11:29 PM
Response to Original message |
6. It's the fisherman's dilemma |
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Capitalism drives you to look out for your own best interest. Above all else, your best interest is paramount. So you will try to gain as much profit for yourself because you have to get before anyone else (because they are looking out for their best interest also). So you eventually run into the fisherman's dilemma (I'll try to remember how it goes exactly).
The fishermen in a small town realize that their over-fishing is depleting the supply of a very valuable fish to the point that they cannot recover. The fishermen make a pact to not fish for those fish for a number of years in an attempt to let them repopulate, thereby saving all of the fishermans' livelihoods. The plan will work if everyone can be trusted and won't go after the profitable fish. With no one catching the fish the market would go up, and an unscrupulous fisherman could make a ton of money. But, if the other fisherman see the expensive fish in the market the agreement would be off and the fish would be hunted to extinction destroying the fishing industry and putting everyone out of work.
It's a classic example of how working for only your own self interest actually is harmful. The modern capitalist works to make as much profit as possible. With everyone doing this the cumulative effect is the destruction of the system they've built.
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Silent3
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Fri Sep-18-09 11:39 PM
Response to Original message |
8. Because they aren't so talented at pulling all of the strings... |
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...as the paranoid conspiracists like to think. Because they don't have a unified agenda that they all necessarily benefit from. Because they count among their number many greedy, self-serving, highly competitive people who are often short-sighted and who are often not geniuses. Because no one, no matter how smart, powerful, and connected really understands how economies work to well enough to be sure what exactly causes what -- although if they were smarter and less short-sighted and less out for personal, short-term gain, they could at least have figured out some of the basics well enough to not cause the mess we have now.
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Quantess
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Sat Sep-19-09 12:37 AM
Response to Reply #8 |
10. True. But yet, the corporate, wealth-controlling assholes |
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Edited on Sat Sep-19-09 12:43 AM by Quantess
don't seem to care whether the marketplace remains friendly to them after they have trashed their own bridges. It's all about NOW, MORE, EXPLOIT!
They definitely aren't smarter than me or you. But they are more powerful, and that makes all the difference.
And, to be clear, I am referring to a handful of Americans: The .001% who control everything.
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Hannah Bell
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Sat Sep-19-09 03:42 AM
Response to Reply #8 |
14. you're assuming it's a mess for *them* - but it may not be. so far not too many seem |
leftstreet
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Sat Sep-19-09 01:51 AM
Response to Original message |
12. They've been in the process of overhauling it since the New Deal |
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Bust unions, gut social programs, privatize everything in sight, globalize
See, they ARE trying to 'fix' it.
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Hannah Bell
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Sat Sep-19-09 03:40 AM
Response to Original message |
13. Maybe they don't. When one gang owns pretty much most of the world, |
barbiegeek
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Sat Sep-19-09 10:25 AM
Response to Original message |
17. They don't want Capitalism they want Oligarchy |
mdmc
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Sat Sep-19-09 10:26 AM
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18. it is working just fine for them |
AllentownJake
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Sat Sep-19-09 10:40 AM
Response to Original message |
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Real Estate is becoming cheaper to buy, no one is cracking down on their bonuses and the federal government just covered up their mistake.
Things are working for them.
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Jade Fox
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Sat Sep-19-09 10:42 AM
Response to Original message |
21. They are choosing short term profit over long term stability.... |
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and have been making that choice for awhile now.
That's the short answer.
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Fri May 10th 2024, 10:30 AM
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