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Chaos in France after Macron refuses to name prime minister from leftwing coalition
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 27 Aug 2024
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Classic brain-dead centrist perspective thanks for sharing.
Any factual argument or just ad-hominem?
here are two arguments:
you can pick the exact middle
It’s hard to judge whether extreme right or extreme left is worse. They are both dangerous for a country, though in a different sense.
I personally am not in the exact middle but being radical is not a choice.
What do you think are the beliefs of the extreme left?
Usually the surreal ones such as extremely high minimum wages, fixed prices for food, state-sponsored housing, etc.
Basically all actions that look very good on paper but at the same time are extremely expensive.
Ooooooooo scary!
Totally the same thing as literally exterminating entire groups of people based on characteristics they were born with.
In all seriousness though, you should look at what Finland has done regarding "public housing," and how great it has been for them. Spoiler alert, they're actually really nice, and affordable. Because nobody is looking to maximize a profit.
But please, let me know how "Finland is much smaller than the US, therefore impossible."
Well yes. They can go for it because they considering their size, they have a strong economy. They are literally the 3rd most prosperous country in the world.
If you can afford it, go for it but firstly you need to make the money.
And how do you think they became prosperous? You have to give people the chance to spend money to have a growing economy, otherwise everyone's keeping money for later and nothings flowing.
Because they have a strong service sector that produces revenue and also good high-technology manufacturing. You make money by producing revenue not from sponsoring everyone’s life. Sure, you can invest in people at the beginning but they need to start making money for your investment to pay off.
Nobody is "sponsoring" anybody's life.
And you're just wrong. "Producing revenue" helps corporations, it does nothing for 99.9% of American citizens. I can't believe we still have to debunk this supply-side horse shit.
Over and over again, Scandinavian countries (and others) have shown us that, if you provide the very basics for human survival (e.g. shelter, health care, food) and perhaps some basic services needed for gainful employment like internet and public transportation, people are not only far happier and healthier, but they are also more productive members of society. It's almost as if it's nearly impossible to be productive when you are constantly stressed over the very basics for human survival. Wild.
There. Is. Literally. No. Down. Side. Unless. You. Are. A. Billionaire.
And even then... Oh no, you have to be a $100 millionaire instead of. $3 billionaire. How will you survive 🙄
First of all, everyone can gain from corporations’ successes. It literally takes 20 minutes to buy their stocks.
Second of all, Scandinavian countries have quite a good model. However, they also have very strong economies to fund it.
ahahahahahahahahahahahaha... that's a good one dude. Didn't expect such a laugh this early. No. Just no.
Supply-side economics (AKA trickle-down) does. not. work. Frankly, there is nothing you can say here that will counteract the decades of real world data we have to prove that no, lowering taxes for corporations absolutely DOES NOT help the working class. It does the exact opposite by enlarging the pay gap between the people who run the company, and the people who actually do the fucking work.
I'd like to believe you're smarter than that...
True, you'd probably need to be maybe the most robust economy in the world to do that... Oh wait. That's us...
First of all, you said regular people cannot benefit from companies’ growth, which is clearly false, because as per my previous reply, you can easily buy their stocks and become one of the shareholders. They even pay you dividends and your wealth grows.
Second issue you mentioned can be easily fixed by having competition in the market. When there are more companies, they have to improve conditions for workers, otherwise they will end up working for the competition. If no company in the market does it, thanks to capitalism you can start you own, offer the best conditions for your employees and they will come to you from the competition. Last but not least, whilst I agree lowering taxes does not necessarily mean rising people’s wages, it at least motivates people to start their own company (which creates more competition and that’s what we want). And yes, people who run the company are equally as important as the workers. It’s literally their responsibility to make decisions regarding the company’s direction. If you have a terrible management, the company goes bankrupt and workers, just like the people who run the company, lose their incomes.
With last statement I agree, US has the space to invest into free medicare, however at the cost of having less influence over the world.
You view those as similar in extremism to Nazis? That's a self report right there.
I would say nazis and communists are equally as bad and equally as dangerous.
I'm gonna go ahead and say you are not a member of any group targeted by the Holocaust then.
My great grandfather was in a concentration camp.
I would rather say your ancestors never lived in a communist country.
lol yes ok very dangerous and equivalent to fascism understood
my opinion of centrists has completely flipped, I totally get why "spending too much" and "enforcing an ethnic hierarchy" are the same degree of evil
snark aside: you should reflect about what exactly money is, what it's used for and what it represents, and how a government spending its own legal tender differs from household finances.
do you even hear yourself jfc
Your comments is literally just ad-hominem too bruh.
I have just pointed out that both sides have extreme views that are dangerous.
What extreme views are coming from the left side?
The right side is fascism, the left side is plans to raise the monthly minimum wage, impose price ceilings on essential foods, electricity, gas and petrol, repeal Macron’s deeply unpopular decision to raise the retirement age to 64, and invest massively in the green transition and public services.
How are those 'exteme' and 'dangerous'?
Exactly those are the views you mentioned. All these are extremely expensive and financing all of them without the debt increase is practically impossible. Combine it with almost no relevant plans how to improve economy and you have got quite a dangerous situation. You cannot just spend money without earning it.
Raising the standard of living and improving the purchasing power of the individual DOES improve the economy because it enables more people to spend more on foods and services. They are financed by raising taxes on the ultra wealthy and corporations. The money is already earned, the difference it whether it gets pocketed and horded by executives or recirculated into the economy by improving the standard of living of the populace
Those ultra wealthy people and corporations are not that stupid. If they see they can exist and pay less in a different country, they will just move. Everyone will be happy apart from the country which rose the taxes.
Of course that rising living standards improves economy but not in a way where you just sponsor good housing for your whole population.
Not true, High Taxes Don't Make Rich People Move
Europe disagrees, infact they site that increasing access to good public housing is critical for the economy going forward
Well sure they don’t flee New York, California and other places where despite high taxes they can still make large amounts of money. Simply because most of development is there. If they can make 50k a month and pay 50% taxes in NY (just an example) compared to 10k and 10% taxes somewhere else (they would just stay).
However, this is not California/NY and you can easily check what high taxes do here. People register companies in Ireland and Cyprus, so they can pay the least taxes possible. Then, due to european union being european union, they can operate in their home country.
We've already established that taxes on the rich/corporations that are used to improve the standard of living of the citizens of the country does increase development and stimulate the economy. Do you have any sources to back up your views? Because so far they don't seem based on any real world data
This still works because you haven’t gone too far. You kept it at a reasonable rate where moving is less advantageous than paying higher taxes. At some point, this will shift.
Here are some examples:
Let the capitalists flee, easier than rounding them up. The workers will still be there, and the workers are the economy
Yes, let the capitalists flee, so there is no one to pay the taxes. That seems like a very wise plan.
In addition, every company needs just workers. Management, engineers and so on are practically useless.
This would surely work very well.
Hint: You can actually see how brilliantly it worked during 1940s-1990s in the countries under Warsaw pact.
lol managers and engineers aren't workers TIL
So essentially no one can leave then? First you say that capitalists should leave but workers stay. Then you say managers and engineers are workers…
So essentially you want everyone to stay?
I see you don't understand the most basic division between the working class and the owning class
You have no class consciousness.
I feel bad that I mocked you earlier, you don't have clear ideas about what capitalism is, what the working class is, or how our economic system is based on economic dictatorship by wealthier people over poorer people.
Socialism is about making the economy into a democracy, you don't want your private life or public life controlled by a dictator, why your work life? That's half your waking hours. You're living in a dictatorship for half the time you're conscious.
The workers should own what they produce, that includes management, it includes "skilled" labor and "unskilled" labor. It includes everyone but the shareholders and private owners who are a parasite.
First of all, I do not see how our lives are based on a dictatorship by wealthier people.
How do you then want to democratize the economy? Do you want companies to have a structure where everyone votes?
You know, there is a significant difference between a state and a company. When you dislike a company, you can very easily just move to another one, when you feel abused by your boss, you can change the job anytime. In most countries, we have no laws that prohibit you from changing your job. On the other hand, to get a citizenship in my country, you need to live here realistically for 8 years. What I am trying to say here is that even if a company has a terrible leadership, it’s not the end of the world. It will probably end bankrupt but people can still find a job somewhere else. On the other hand, incompetent leading of a state can impact life more seriously and most importantly an individual cannot change the situation easily.
Last but not least you are saying that shareholders and private owners are parasites is not true at all. They give money to the company. Without that, you can have skilled employees but will they work for the sake of enjoying life in a democratic company? I highly doubt.
you really can't imagine anything else can you? this is what's called "capitalist realism"
I can. But pragmatically capitalism has been the best option so far.
Yes it appears to be your deity.
You really don't understand the alternatives, it's clear from this thread.
There is a difference between not understanding the alternatives and providing reasons why they are overall worse.
yes and all you've done is repeat slogans while not demonstrating that your understand the alternatives.
You're clueless about how a socialist economy can function (there are actually many different ways) and everything you say is through the lens of your current capitalist neoliberal life. You're imagining micro-adjustments that betray a complete lack of understanding and imagination.
I'm not going to convince you or get through to you so we can go our separate ways, but you're extremely confident for someone who really doesn't get it, and that's just unfortunate for your own sake
What exactly am I not getting about socialist economy?
The ones who disagree with socialism are usually told they just don’t understand it & that it has not been tried.
Reality is, it’s been tried and it always failed.
there's another slogan.....
Look at the variety of capitalist countries and how they differ, knowing what "capitalism" is helps you to understand which aspects of them relate to that and which aspects of them are political, cultural, social. I could easily point to terrible capitalist countries and say it just doesn't work, but there are degrees aren't there?
Also consider that democracy was tried, reverted to Empire, then wasn't tried again for over 1000 years. France tried it, reverted to Empire, then tried it again. In those gaps your argument would be used to deny attempting democracy.
Knowing what "socialism" means would help you to understand how it has been, hasn't been, and can be implemented. But you're drooling on yourself repeating things you've heard like "but I like my toothbrush"
You're doing yourself a disservice, and at least have the decency to keep your regurgitated opinions to yourself.
There is quite a difference between democracy and socialism. For example, while democracy did not work in France, there were several other countries that have proven democracy works. For example, Greece, Rome, or even United States. On the contrary, socialism has been in many countries and failed every single time, no matter the situation. Countries of Warsaw pact tried it and 30 years after it collapsed, the quality of life in these countries is still worse compared to the Western Europe. Similar with countries such as Israel, India, Great Britain, North Korea and many more that have tried socialist tendencies but eventually returned to capitalist economies.
Same for capitalism, there have been countries that became quite successful thanks to it such as Switzerland, Singapore or Ireland.
So you're judging historical democracies by their peaks and successes but you're judging socialist/communist countries by their low points and failures.
Russia went from a serfdom to a world superpower. It challenged the United States for decades despite losing millions of its population and being absolutely devastated in world war 2 whereas the USA was relatively unscathed.
These aren't good faith arguments. You make every argument working from your conclusion backwards.
That's not how modern monetary policy works, by the way. The US dollar has a ton of power worldwide for many reasons, so we determine what our money is worth, period. This is why every time the US government has spent money on "demand side" solutions (stimulus checks, etc.) they have provided nothing but upside.
This little trick that capitalists don't want you to know about: it's all bullshit. They want us to keep injecting cash into failing banks rather than just paying for people's garbage mortgages.
We owe nothing to nobody because those debts will never be paid (who would they even be paid to?).
There is zero practical reason (beyond "oh no, billionaires and multinational corporations need to pay taxes wahhh") that we cannot spend as much money as we like on every social program we like. Prove me wrong (or just read about "Modern Monetary Theory" as I'm not an economist).
Have you heard about what happened to greece?
For example, one third of population lived in poverty (in Greece) due to economic crisis. Is that not enough to take responsible money management seriously?
Greece doesn't have the largest economy in the world. Their currency isn't the Petrodollar like USD is. The world economy runs on USD. I don't think you understand just how much power and freedom that affords us with regards to spending. Not your fault because it's been hammered into us for decades by "fiscal conservatives." But the actual reality is that we have far more control over these things than those people want you to think.
The only way spending on social programs could ever possibly tank the US economy is if billionaires and corporations purposely did so out of spite, and desire to return to the times when they could get away with being robber barons (AKA right now). And unfortunately, it would probably work.
That said, even if you don't believe that Modern Monetary Theory is real (again, you should read about it from actual economists, not me), we could very easily take care of every person in this country, legal or not, if we even modestly reduced our "defense" budget, and properly taxed corporations and the uber-wealthy.
Are you from the past? Like 2014?