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78 sats \ 6 replies \ @0xbitcoiner OP 22h \ parent \ on: Is Capitalism Making Us Lonely? AskSN
Yeah, I think that's the gist of it. So what's capitalism to you?
For starters, the idea of a free market and respect for private property. That doesn't exist anywhere, so far as I can tell. So, I don't see how the author can even ask the question of whether capitalism leads to loneliness, because capitalism has never been tried anywhere, and particularly not in Europe. Government manages the economy.
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@Undisciplined broke it down for me, makes way more sense now. And yeah, I don’t think pure capitalism’s ever really been a thing. Might never be, because the government’s basically the biggest corporation anyway!
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I agree. we had just small spasms, an emulation of capitalism since it is mostly unfree and property is granted by threat in case of non-payment of taxes. You are right in this approach, however, these spasms of people making voluntary exchanges locally with each other are capitalism in its essence.
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This clears up the disconnect.
There are two common uses of the term. One is what you’re describing, which includes nominally private enterprises with lots of state interference.
The other, which most of us tend to use, is private enterprise without state interference.
We usually use cronyism or corporatism for the current system.
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Makes more sense now, thanks!
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The term is historically muddy because it started as a commie smear of western industrial economies, which is basically the usage you’re familiar with, but then libertarians/objectivists/liberals co-opted it and made it synonymous with free markets.
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