What is socialism? | Steve Keen and Lex Fridman
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 19 มิ.ย. 2024
- Lex Fridman Podcast full episode: • Steve Keen: Marxism, C...
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Steve Keen is a heterodox economist and author.
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Lex, could you have Steve Keen and Richard Wolff on at the same time? That dialogue/debate, guided by your questions, could be fascinating and instructive!
I'll second this and the debate format(once a week maybe)may take off with Lex's audience.
double nutjob coming your way
strong yes.
Richard Wolff is also a crank that no one in the economics profession takes seriously. If you want a good economist to interview you should check out Thomas Sowell, Bryan Caplan, or Benjamin Powell.
He breaks things down so it's easily digestible and to understand for someone who is completely ignorant of this highly esoteric space. Which is an indicator of someone who really knows what they're talking about and has a high degree of expertise on these topics. Very interesting episode. Dare I say one of the best!.
@@tonyfranco8581 watch the whole podcast for that my friend.
@@tonyfranco8581 thats a shame. Never let your emotions get in the way of a good education. Oh well.
@@tonyfranco8581 Socialism is when the people own and regulate everything. He says it in the first 20 seconds. Duh
@@tonyfranco8581 the fact you think you know the socialist doctrine more than these people is hilarious
From the clips lex is putting out this guys seems like he has no idea what he is talking about. Him trying to explain MMT was hilariously bad.
Socialism in Britain has never been conflated with communism except by its enemies. It was born of a poor but intelligent man's observation and articulation of the obscenity of the bulk of the population of the richest nation on earth living in abject poverty. His name was Kier Hardy so the heart of British socialism is Hardyism
Marx was very active encouraging the British Trade Union movement, only the latter's xenophobia stopped a formal affiliation with the IWA. After the Soviets took power until the Prague Spring, the Labour Party and British Trade Movement was riddled with direct Communist infiltration and Entryism
@@caratacus6204 yeah, as was and is the tories with extreme right wingers with far less scrutiny. No political movement is free from entryism but the juxtoposition of widespread and increasing deprivation and channeling of more and more wealth into fewer and fewer hands is the stark injustice that he, Hardy, confronted, as must we in these times of global robber baron resurgence.
And then there is Laurelism which goes hand in hand with Hardyism.
Yes very much the fool to Hardy's Lear don't you think?
1) scarcity of resources has not ever in history (and thus is not likely in the future) imposed a necessity for equality or equal distribution of said resources (unless enforced by a government and / or through force - and even then black market forces often come into play). Although I do welcome a counter example if someone has one please.
2) the essence of capitalism is absolutely NOT limited to what you can make in a factory. Mr. Keen is being fluid with his definitions and altering them to suit his argument here (and he's more than smart enough to know it). Capitalism by definition doesn't differentiate between commodity or unique item(s) in that it allows private actors through supply and demand to freely set prices in markets which best serve that society regardless of whether the items in question are commodities or "priceless" one-off unique items (which sell and trade at some ultimately agreed upon price). ALL value is set through subjective valuation (yes, even commodity items) in that it requires demand. This is why there are markets for both "priceless" works of art as well as the stated $2 back scratchers and they are ALL driven by demand.
He's wrong on ownership. Yes, community ownership often means state ownership, but plenty of socialists view it as worker ownership. They're quite different.
I think that due to the complex nature of socialism, and ownership as viewed by Marx, he may have been condensing it down for the sake of brevity and therefore oversimplified
@@jamesreynold6711 That's a fair enough reading
I’m not arguing, but I’m wondering what’s the difference? Worker ownership vs state ownership seems to me like almost a meaningless semantic distinction rather than a practical one in a socialist society, but I’ll openly admit I am no socialism expert.
I think to my mind, in a socialist society, the workers are only able to claim ownership of anything bc they’re back by the State, meaning at the end of the day, anyone who disputes the workers’ ownership will be made to submit through violence and coercion aka the protected instruments of the state.
And it’s hardly “true ownership” if it can be just as easily reversed or forgotten by the very same state and tools, just that has a slightly different interpretation of ideals and priorities of the society.
Does that make any sense or am I doing a terrible job trying to communicate my thoughts here haha? Hahaha
Agreed. He's talking,.in some sense, about State Capitalism
It reinforces the cliche that Socialism is"when the government does stuff". This is wrong!
Rather new here,Lex. Thank you for the content. Thank you for the good conversation
Re; *Resource Scarcity* Is it accurate to conceptualize the two terms "scarce" and "rare" as distinguishing manufactured/reproducible from crafted/non-reproducible items? (11:04)
Where Steve appears to go off track is that he says that we don't understand scarcity, but the basis of scarcity is the fact that all resources are finite. So, it isn't possible for all goods to be produced simultaneously without taking into account resource allocation based on supply and demand.
Scarcity comes from 1300s anglo-french meaning: "restrcited resource". Capitalism uses the term correctly.
Few resource that is true limiting factor is labor and the associated intelligence. Even oil is not truly scarce if one can build ocean going tankers and drill deep. So yes resources can technically be scarce but only insofar as one lack technology, civilization and labor. To speak of mineral shortage in this technological era is just wrong and to speak of money 'shortages' ( means of exchange) should be a crime against humanity.
If you let certain people decide there wont be enough supply of food even thought there is demand so no, resource can be finite ( in theory any ways) but mostly it's a question of whether people own arable land and can farm it or if it's all taken by one person and sold to those who can afford it.
If you close your eyes you can almost imagine Sir Michael Caine and Lex having a conversation about Socialism.
Literally from opposite sides of the globe...
To many bars for lex I think 😆 🤣 😂
He sounds high af
Too*
@@cutterholt3987 who hurt you
Even marx wrote on his mancom, that in each country they could adapt the checklist depending on the real conditions.
But anyway, socialism is pre marx.
Scarcity of resources and need for heavy industry informed why the American frontier was also largely egalitarian. I think it's likely we will just move through economic/political cycles as we always have historically.
How does the High Septon from GOT knows so much about Economics?
I still say Keen has a very narrow view of how socialism as a philosophy evolved. State ownership was hotly debated in the rise of the USSR as many saw it simply a change of ownership wiltjout bringing liberty of workers to aphasia e agency in the workplace via ownership and control of it.
Basically its Rostows stages of economic development which commonly thought of as modernization to create democratization in societies. But going further and having a social revolution when the capitalist means of production has eroded any dimension of mutual benefit via affordability and wellness.
I wonder if a local currency monetary revolution will start to emerge when the effects of global warming lead us into a catastrophic dark age.
Lex would love technocracy movement were its a society ran by experts mainly being stem professionals that would also change the economic system to value commodities as currency just as having a petrol coupon/currency.
thanks
Explain private and personal property!
Wish they would have explored why the guest thinks we are at the end of capitalism.
In a capitalists economy, everybody tries to pay everybody as little as possible.
is the price to pay for innovation.
innovation is fundamental for our survival
Only on the supply side. You could also say that everyone tries to work as little as possible.
It's true but communism won't pay you at all.
Is that why all the people who got government checks and support work so hard,
They have their needs met right,
So shouldn’t they be happy and prospering in the thought of socialists
7:22
This sounds like what china practiced in its "Reform and Opening" up period.
And here is the link of the soviet economist's wiki link( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grigory_Feldman )
As an American, I know what Socialism is, but I find that people who are pro-socialist, believe all public works/projects are what Socialism is. (edit) Steve McQueen rode a Triumph in the Great Escape, as I recall, but not a BMW or BMW clone.
Public works/projects, as you put it, are an application of socialist theory.
This is why people dont like this very weird, specific and not really existent in the real world, definition of socialism. Because its mostly a paper theory and it never actually addresses the real world application of socialist theory.
@@undergrounddojokeyboardcag701 Well, I can't speak to any theory, as I have no economic background, public works are not controlling the means of production, more the delivery of commonly used services. So you may be absolutely correct, but living in a state with a government owned utility, I have experienced the difference. Thank you for the response
Australia is by far one of the most socialist countries out there with a it economy being underdeveloped and........... We smack the crap out of the majority of countries who fly the capatalist flag if not all
@@nomehdrider Be it a service or a product, it does not matter and it also does not matter if its commonly used or rarely used. The second you take these out of the private industry and create a government entity to do this, deem the government use tax dollars to charter private industry to do that job under the responsibility of government, or reserves part of an industry for government and allow another part for private, these are all variations of socialist theory as we've seen applied in the real world.
In an attempt to redefine socialism in a way that covers all of the real world socialist theory applications we've seen, i came up with this (it needs edits, but its a solid start i think): "The reservation of an industry deemed to be vital to the function of society, that government retains full or partial control of".
@@undergrounddojokeyboardcag701 It is absolute hilarity trying to listen to the mental gymnastics people do to try to exclude public works / projects from being considered socialism, when that's literally what they are. Every country that has ever existed, including all of the countries today, has had some level of socialism in their economy, and some level of capitalism. This is called a mixed economy. The USA is not 100% capitalist, and China is not 100% Communist, and neither was the USSR.
To paraphrase Arthur C Clark, any sufficiently large corporation is indistinguishable from (authoritarian) government. They centrally plan pay, prices and products. They also control all information customers may know about these things. It is far more complete than “socialism”, “fascism”, or even feudalism. It is Mother and Father and aware of how you even wipe your bottom and who your mistress is.
Madness keen what are you talking about inovation!!! who was the first in space with animal's, human's, satellite's, and space stations??? Or cybernetics Viktor Glushkov father of modern computing and the OGAS system which is the foundation of the internet!
Feldman's model is the present course of Volkswagen they are investing billions in factories on various continents and producing very few autos expecting the percentages to reverse in the coming decade
Just an FYI for the viewers who care: this guy is thought of as a crank in the economics community, by and large. That doesn't mean everything he says is wrong but for a majority of this podcast he isn't speaking as an economist, he is telling his own narrative and view with some loose economic justification sprinkled throughout. If we value the endeavor of economics as a science then one watching should take Steve Keen with a heavy hand of salt, because unfortunately a lot of the things he says really misses the point and you can even see it in just this video.
I take everyone, especially "economists" with a grain of salt. His perspective is interesting so far. Especially on Marx
can you provide examples for the layman?
In the podcast keen explains why eonomics, as it is taught in Universities, should not be valued as a science.
@@matthewbazeley2984 well, he sounds right about that
I watched the entire podcast and this dude is a genius.
In Scandinavia I guess they have a good balance regarding socialism and capitalism. Paying decent, paternal/maternal leave at childbirth, 5 payed weeks of vacation, free schools, healthcare and universities etc.
If you start a business and it fails, your dept is nullified after 5 years so you can start over.
With big oil to fund the economy and its social services.
It’s only Norway regarding oil, and they use it indirectly - sell oil, invest the money, then only spend at max 3,5 % of the revenue from the investments.
@@monsieurbrock4156 Greece has much of the same without the wealth so it can be done elsewhere and is not dependent on the country's wealth but in many ways how democratic it is and what the citizens can demand from their various collected oligarchs.
@@ststrength5044 Norway has that as well as that the entire western European model /USA is significantly based on the fact that they can dominate the world trough violence and extra concessions and resources which their oligarchs can then use to pacify their own citizens while keeping their profits high. if they could not keep profits high by these means repression at home would be even higher but hey it's own of those small 'benefits' of empire that only comes at the cost of poverty for billions of people in other places.
The Kawasaki KLXR650 didn't come out until 1980...
I'm pretty sure that during the 50's they only had up to 450 or 480cc dirt bikes?
The British motorcycle industry suffered just as much from lack of innovation in a capitalist economy as did their Russian eqivalent. Urals by the way are still popular in 2023.
Ah defining socialism using the dictionary. Seems like a novel concept. lol
It just so happens to align with Marx’s philosophy. Imagine that.!
One of the most cunning free market innovations is built-in obsolescence.
Tyranny is tyranny. Tyrants use all kinds of justifications for their tyranny. Back in the day, it was religion: the divine right of kings. These days, the fashion is to claim you're actually democratic (North Korea's official name is the People's _Democratic_ Republic of Korea). And in the early part of the 20th century, the fashion was to claim you were socialist.
The tyranny of the USSR does not refute socialism any more than then the tyranny of North Korea refutes democracy.
But it does refute socialism because hundreds of millions of people died implementing it in a diverse range of countries.
@@CE-vd2px So are you opposed to democracy due to the large number of dictatorships who have used _that_ to justify their tyranny?
Socialism is - as Keen points out - public ownership of the means of production. _State_ ownership of the means of production would only qualify as socialism if that state were highly responsive to the wishes of the public.
The USSR was not that.
Socialism is Marxism communism is Marxism it's all the same s*** it All leads to Communism every time it's been implemented people starve you have genocide etc never once has it been good how many times you got to poke yourself in the eye before you know it's not good
@milos durovic No, that's got to do with _colonialism,_ which is an unethical foriegn policy and not a system of government.
NK is actually democratic in the Socialist sense, not Liberal though...
So I guess the better system is a hybrid one that integrates the best aspects of both capitalism and socialism. Encouraging innovation without screwing over the people making the products
*AKA the Nordic model used by Scandinavian countries*
@@grb1969 capitalism is not a utopian idea, it is highly practical based off self interest. You must sacrifice your own self interest to give someone else what they want for them to in turn satisfy your self interest in a different way.
@@CE-vd2px Capitalism is based on the idea of taking advantage of other people. Its dishonest at its core. An employer wouldn't hire a single employee if they couldn't make money off of them. Raw Capitalism would pay you nothing if they could and the goal is to pay the employee as less as humanly possible which in turn makes them money money. It cares about nothing but money. Its anti rights and anti human. Can we make money is the only question. Kill a bunch of people, does it make us money. Posion people, does it make us money. Its authorarism at its core also, anti democracy and anti republic. I don't recommend the other systems ether though. In my opinion they are different streams leading to the same path.
@@toddjoseph2412 Duh, that is why we the people have to fight
So in a socialist economy if I start a business on top of paying my workers I have to share any profits?
If you want extra workers, they will be business partners
Stop writing bs
You yourself can't start any business in socialism. There is no free or private enterprise.
First off, you may not even be allowed to start a business. But if you are allowed then you have to pay massive fees to the government, they will take most of what you make, of course humans will always find ways to steal and hide some of those earnings but it is a constant struggle with the authorities.
In a social economy you don't start a company ,the government does it for you . Everyone is paid the same at the level they do. Workers all the same , administrators all the same ,the profit belongs to the state .
Socialism means the means of production is owned by the workers, it doesn't mean centralised ownership, government ownership, soviet style economics or any of the other things that is falsely assumed. These are just ways that socialism has been tried in the past. There are any number of ways socialism could be expressed in a modern economy, but the key feature is that the profit goes back to the workers, not to a class of owners that get super rich on the backs of workers. An example, if the structure of businesses and corporations was changed by law to resemble cooperatives, where every cooperative was required to give all profit back in the form of reduced prices of goods and services, or by funding local community services or funding community projects, then profit is distributed evenly back into society and this society would be considered socialist even though it still has markets and would resemble capitalism in almost every way except there wouldn't be a super rich class of owners that were rich just because they were allowed to extract labour from a working class. This is just 1 example, we can think up a thousand more. I'm so sick of these morons pretending that it's capitalism or soviet centralised planning, 2 options, for all eternity. It's ridiculous.
"was changed by law". You lost me there. If you want to make a cooperative and believe its gonna work, do it, but the very essence of inovation and mass production come from capitalists who risks their necks and achieve success. You cant prohibit people to start companies.
@@mailson4526 in capitalism you can't, because that's the rules for how capitalism works. An alternative economic system would have different rules, that's the point, the rules are all made up and they produce the game we all are forced by law to play. If you think you're not forced to play capitalism, try stop paying rent, or try stop paying taxes, say you're starting your own society with your own monetary system, you won't get far, because you're not actually free to participate, you're forced by the state under threat of violence. The freedom you think you have already is an illusion.
@@mailson4526 No if you risk your neck as a capitalist you are not a capitaliat for long. A good capitalist fixes the game so that there is very little to no risk at all. Risk management is a part of every business model for that very reason. You take the fewest risks possible under capitalism as a rule. You are doing exactly what the guy in the video was saying about distorting the reality of things by focusing on a small part of the whole.
People who are aspiring entrepreneurs and desire to become capitalists take risks because they have to in order to become successful capitalists who no longer have to take those risks. They are the anomally and not the norm. Capitalism is not high stakes gambling.
This is the problem with discussing capitalism. People are so mind f'ed by pro capitalist narratives and propaganda that they cannot see the forrest for the trees. It is like the self regulating free market delusion and all of the other mental masturbatory nonsense that has been created to give it some ideological backbone where there was once a total void. It is a complete departure from reality and a highly calculated myth to steer people away from true capitalist tendencies and habits. Capitalism is all about using existing surplus capital to create exponentially more capital in the safest, most profitable, and least risky way possible. It is all about leveraging your advantages over your competition not taking risks.
@@theprinceofcrows8691 i believe theres always risks no matter how established a company is. Microsoft, Ford... they were the best one day and many talked about monopoly, collision... and new outta nowhere entrants challenged them and took their n.1 status. Only system that allows that is capitalism, no matter how governments disturb and distort it.
@@mailson4526 There are all kinds of risk mitigation strategies that make risk miniscule in comparison to the lore of the modern narrative. We live in a world where capitalism uses the entire state apparatus to offset private and personal risk and create a rigged environment according to their needs. Like with R&D, where most losses and risk is taken is socialized and the burden placed on the government and taxpayer, while the profits are then privatized along with the breakthrough. There are those who take risks but companies like Ford and Microsoft are not inclined to take any risks that are of the sort implied when you hear the reference to risk takers. Capital has built a system to offset risk almost entirely in most areas.
Microsoft in particular has such an enormous hold on the industry and in fact the world that it has more leverage than most countries do. That is the pinnacle of capital but most of capital in America is finance capital which uses all kinds of leverage and rigging of the game to make risk almost nonexistent.
Or look at the way the recent vaccines were developed 100% risk free because of government backing and guaranteed profit. The name of the game is to avoid risk like the plague and to use any leverage you can obtain to make risk a part of the past. Only the upstart is exposed to the real risks people theorize when they discuss the subject and that is because they are not yet a capitalist proper.
Am I wrong in hearing that socialism doesn't suck, people suck?
If it doesn't work for its intended users (people) then it is not a very good system.
Come on, there is a clear checklist on the manifcom. Its not that hard.
Social democracy self identify as socialists. We should generalize the definition of socialism as the democratization of economic power.
Like the theory of Communism, Socialism has never been fully realized, or bastardized into something else completely. What about Denmark, Norway? Some have made it work; Democratic Socialism seems compatible, and representative. Capitalism has it's place, but without controls, it has led to what's happening now, and that ain't good. Massive income disparity, near slave wages, no public healthcare, inflation.....every extreme is bad!
Just a thought, The terms socialism communism and capitalism are being redefined by the explosion of exponential technologies. Hopefully in the near future manual labor will become more of a lifestyle that are necessity and the very definition of economy will be redefined 🤔IMO
Excellent podcast
"Socialism": a mild, non-threatening way to say AUTHORITARIAN COLLECTIVISM.
Democratic socialism is collectivism for the majority (the working class and the poor). Capitalism is corporate collectivism for the rich. Capitalists and corporations are the greatest collectivists of all. Just look at their billions. 🙂
I would say, the AK-47, sending man to space for the first time, the first cellphone and Tetris are good examples of soviet innovation.
Tetris hardly came out from the state planned economy, it was something Alexey Pajitnov did in spare time as a student, and fortunately software finds that borders are very porous indeed.
@@robertwalkley4665 it was invented in the 80s during Soviet Union. Even if the state wasn’t involved and he did it in his spare time, it just shows innovation was possible by individuals. He wasn’t chased by the government for doing it.
The problem is that there’s just a ton more innovation and innovation doesn’t necessarily mean “consumer product” or “headline grabbing technological feat”. Innovation can mean hundreds of thousands of small improvements that aren’t exciting at all to the average person.
@@evandrolima1724 Oh, I have no doubts about the brilliance of so many Russian individuals, I'm just keen to not credit "soviet innovation" for it.
The AK-47 was based on the German StG 44
Or how about this, I know it's a crazy idea. You don't "concentrate on the means of production, building car factories and luxury goods factories".
You allow men to act freely to pursue their own self interest and if that means opening an ice cream shop, planting a hard wood forest or making rocketships then you allow them to win or lose based on the demand from those who want it through voluntary exchange.
How you defend these ideas even now, against the obvious reasons they fail, and rationalize why they are so amazing...while minimizing the ideas which made human life so worthwhile, is amazing to me.
This leads to another problem, why does the nation exist? What is the output of your nation? How do you compete with other nations? Once everyone is going in their own direction, you lose the nation.
Why does he defend these ideas? Because he's a smart man. Capitalism destroys humanity and the planet. Socialism on a digital foundation is the solution.
14:17 "If I have a vision of a utopia in the future, it has bugger all to do about what humans get out of it"
So human concerns are at the bottom of the list of priorities in your ideal system? A system that doesn't benefit people in any way at all? Your utopia sounds like a monstrosity to me.
I agree. He seems to have his head in the clouds. How can he go from talking about how we’ve destroyed this planet & how we are going to pay the price to “when we move onto a new planet (assumingely because we destroyed THIS one) with scarce resources- everyone will finally share & there will be equality”
Literally EVERYTHING in our history points to the contrary.
We explore, “discover”, colonize, extract, extract, extract, destroy, start exploring
Rinse & repeat.
the guys leaving the in clouds are the ones dreaming about mars and shit like that. only oblivious autistic nerds actually think that "conquering mars" is a feasiable project, and even making it habitable for humans. while ignoring the big problem: we are a cancer. we need to reinvent ourselves and prioritize saving this planet otherwise even if by a miracle we terraform another planet we are gonna keep destroying it eventually because we are gonna be the same mean apes.
elon musk cultists are the worst... and shame on lex that is like 30 something and still thinks FIRST on finding means to leaving this mess instead of solving it first. Jesus! sometimes being intelligent doesn't mean being wise.
one more thing: you forgot to mention that the guest clearly mentions that he belives the focus is in respecting life. big thing to forget when critizicing his "mounstrosity" of a utopia lol.
@@Afreshio I don't think he considers human life to be very important considering he wants a system that "HAS BUGGER ALL TO DO WITH WHAT HUMANS WANT" right from his mouth, humans don't matter in his perfect little utopia
Anytime someone says that the public ownership, that ownership is in a representative manner. In the end, it's just government owned and they will screw it up because people are not motivated to do anything good if they feel like they are not the beneficiary of it. The ones working are equal partners with those who don't, and they see that they have the same life if they work hard and do a good job as they do if they work harder at not working and do a terrible job. They will also see that the real beneficiaries are the government higher ups who will replace the private owners as the new oligarchs.
If you want to see an example of how this works in the private sector, just look at any restaurant where the owner is there working everyday. That business will be the best it could possibly be. Then one day the owner decides that it's time for him to step back and let the managers run the store. As soon as the one who is the top beneficiary, the one who has pride in his creation, and the one who is responsible for the whole thing leaves and puts it in the hands of someone who only makes an hourly wage, has no pride in the business or their work, and could just go find another job if they lose this one, the quality will go down. I've seen several stores go under because there was no owner to take pride in the store and to be responsible and to reap the rewards of taking on that responsibility. We have had three in my area and they always go under because it's a corporate franchise and no one is ever there who truly cares about the business. So the employees will shut down the drive-thru and lock the doors lava business is still open because they make the same money regardless. And they're too dumb to realize that they are running it in the dirt and will lose their job. And that's exactly what will happen with public ownership of what should be Private industry.
The innovation? Planned obsolescence lol
Lots of haters up in here.
This was so lame. Proof that just because someone is "esteemed" doesn't mean they a. make sense or b. are connected to reality in any way. He demonstrates clearly that at this point the academic class has jumped the shark. 6:24 Capitalism is about keeping wages low BUT AT THE SAME TIME taking demand away from your rivals. Um, how does one do that? Exactly, by offering the skilled workers from the other companies HIGHER WAGES in order to attract them in order to defeat your rivals. The only people who prosper under socialism are bureaucrats who steal the public wealth and lazy workers who are content to get paid the same as their more productive counterparts. This isn't even an opinion...history has CONSISTENTLY demonstrated this. God! He's clearly intelligent enough to know this which only leaves the possibility that he's being wilfully disingenuous
Wrong. Communism is the public ownership of the means of production. Socialism is government reallocation of some wealth generated by the private ownership of the means of production.
Lex blokie, did he just say he dated a major ? “Girlfriend” hmmmmm
That’s awkward
Bad. THUMBS UP!
Why the f***k do we need new stuff all the time, anyway? iPhone 27 is not inovation, it’s trolling.
Firstly the word he was looking for with regards to the Nazi’s was crony capitalism.
Secondly I thought to myself if he even says the words “ownership of the means of production” I will laugh out loud. Within a minute I laughed, what does that even mean?
Thirdly and this is the most important thing he needs to understand, to most people socialism is “free stuff”, a human “right” being taken care of by the State. Again whatever that means?
You hear it all the time as a bat to hit capitalism with that A isn’t doing well because B is and capitalism is the evil root cause.
So C (the government) must intervene and make things if not equal then more equal. This egalitarian “thinking” is still simply flawed and expecting people to behave differently when compelled to do something by party C will be just the same now as in Bolshevik Russia.
Advanced economies will crumble if people are not free to pursue their own interests.
His thinking on innervation is a bit off the mark too. The everyday people could not benefit from their own endeavours freely with each other.
But the glaring contradiction is its military, innovative absolutely and able to produce over 6,000 nuclear warheads we are all worried about about now. Can’t feed their own people but can destroy the world.
Which dovetails neatly into the other argument against capitalism. The environment.
Name a clean socialist country? I will await.
And don’t you dare go Scandinavian, especially Norway.
You are an amazing human Lex.
Scotland could be regarded as quite socialist, no fee for Higher education, free prescription, free bus pass up to 21 years old
I know and look at the state of it, no private property laws, no trespassing laws, economic destruction and a massive increase in drug deaths, unemployment and social issues. Anti NATO, anti American, Anglophobic, nationalistic, corrupt and autocratic party in power, its shambolic!
@@fightforaglobalfirstamendm5617 pish
ALL Things they can't Really Afford .... & AN INDEPENDENT Scotland Would not be able to afford ANY of Them
Why say free? Its all paid for through taxation.
They can be "socialist" because what happens in Scotland is that they have vast resources with little population, hence they can actually distribute the wealth/resources to the point of being wasteful in the next hundred year without worrying too much. However, this is not the case for many if not most of other countries where there were wars and did not go through a phrase of capitalism, many of their resources are contaminated or already been spent during war time. Once they start to introduce more immigrants into the Scotland, you will see their budget spending will be way different.
My first major girlfriend
The fallen nature of human beings is missing from this equation and thinking and renders this conversation meaningless and folly
Oh shut up with that biblical nonsense. We're not 'fallen'.
As history shows with absolute clarity, those societies that embrace socialism (let alone comunism) end up enjoying full employment, endless prosperity, perfect distribution of wealth and hapyness for everyone (and liberty!!!) Do we really have to endure all this propaganda?
What is missing in this segment is the value of innovation brings to society. Innovation without exploitation and free markets is what works. Socialism doesn't have innovation and solely aims to control people and how goods and services are produced.
Why can't people see that. Socialism has been tried and it has only led to oppression
Also creates bureaucracy and with that comes corruption. And that is how you loose quality
@@thehun5676 but there is immense amounts of corruption in communism as well. People are naturally greedy.
Australia is definitely not indicative and is socialist but it's definitely a top 3 country in the world. Please explain it to me. Also explain how the most capitalist country USA does hold a candle too it
What is the point in having 100 different products if most of them are unnecessary waste, polluting, unhealthy, and not increasing people's well being. A good example of this is the USA. The cereal aisle is the size of a parking lot in Europe, but many of them use products that would not meet European standards of health quality. If you are not rich, in the USA your life expectancy has decreased. Medical bankruptcy is common. Gun violence is common. Obesity is common. Video games have become gambling. Most people in USA do not have more than $1000 in savings, and will never afford buying a home.
Innovating for profit, does not mean innovating for a better life.
What is the point in having all that wealth and making 'new' stuff if you're not making life better?
Steve is right. Capitalism, at least in America, hit a wall. And has been on a decline ever since.
Russia had/has comunism. Yugoslavia had Socialism. I would like to see someone go deep into Yugoslavia system, there is a lot to learn and discover
Yugoslavia was shithole. That country was founded on genocide in WW2. Also yugoslavian workers worked more hours and were underpayed compared to western countries. Yugoslavian factories were inferior compared to western one. Also also that country would never survive without massive financial aid from USA, Red cross, UNRRA and other organizations
Ah yes the difference between Fascism and Socialism "During their occupation of Western Europe, the Nazis starved city
dwellers quite efficiently but the farmers and all the people with farm connections never starved. The only leaders who succeeded in creating huge famines were Stalin and Mao who, in obeisance to their communist dogma, destroyed independent farming and killed more people than all medieval famines combined." Rene Girard
An East Germany-produced vehicle prior to the fall of the Berlin wall called the Trabant is another great example of the lack of innovation that occurred on the USSR-controlled side of the Berlin Wall. Imagine parking one next to a Porsche 911 from the same year. The difference is astounding!
What the actual fuck is he saying. If we go back to the original desire for socialism in industrial society it was WORKERS owning democratically and collectively the places in which they worked. In other words the place we spend 90% of our lives - work - would be a place in which we all democratically decide how the work place is run. It doesnt matter if reading this you disagree whether that would work or what that idea turned into in certain countries...the point is hes being asked to describe what it was, and im sorry but state ownership was a basterdisation of the original desire for workers ownership. Revolutionary catalonia was an example of this idea. Funnily enough the minute workers ACTUALLY got in control of things there - "in the saddle" as orwell said - every other ideologiy came down like a ten ton hammer on them in spain from fascists to liberal democracies.
Bourgeoisie b.s. that's why keen is ostracized by the MMT community 🥴
If you want to control the means of production, just buy some shares and vote them. How come that doesn't work for them?
Because we can't afford enough shares to make any different and if we could they would issue difference non voting class of shares to ensure that the plebs have no say in who gets the profits.
First
So how do we hustle to get you more subscribers bro because people need to hear these conversations I'm serious I'm 25 years old man and I can't tell you how much I feel like I know you well and I guarantee a lot of other people do God bless you in Jesus name we all love you 💙
I cant stand how wrong people get these terms, including this guy.
Ive found one of the biggest issues with the term socialism (removing the obvious success of demonizing the term, equating it to communism and ensuring ppl don't understand it by the American government) is when people attempt to define it, they try to use one of the paper theory definitions. The problem with this is it never covers the real world application and any serious person should instantly recognize this. And theres a real world application is that every single government applies socialist theory in some way.
Fascism, is not "national socialism" for fucks sake.... how bad at your job do you have to be to say this? Fascism does not equal the Nazi party, the Nazi party (a mixed government) was fascist. You cant just shift these things to other aspects of government and then call it a day. Socialism is a domestic trade theory. You cant say "well, lets remove it being a trade theory, and say its "direction" now". No, you're defining a different theory now.
Then what's socialism?
@@yeraycatalangaspar195 The collective sharing of your mom.
@@yeraycatalangaspar195 Im just kidding buddy. Im going to be honest, i don't even know how to answer this question anymore.
I mean... as a pure theory i guess you can go ahead and go with the dictionary definition. But of course i have to point out that the biggest problem with this is that there's multiple paper theories for defining socialism, which one do we use?
When i am in a conversation about socialism, i tend to not even mention the definition and merely highlight that its a domestic trade theory that is applied to every single government in some way or another. Which i will now circle back around to the definitions topic, and ask.... do i instead create a definition based on the real world application of socialist theory? I mean, that seems like it would be far more valuable to any conversation and application of political science. And if we do that, which one's do we focus on? Do we go by average rankings on say, international freedom indexes? Or by the country rankings of the related mechanisms?
If i was to personally define it i'd have to include something that would cover the real world application so that its something more and more accurate than a general outline written 90 years ago that does not actually highlight the functions of.
So i don't really know, but i think it would have to include something like "The reservation of an industry deemed to be vital to the function of society, that government retains full or partial control of".
Something like that.
This definition or one with a similar focus would cover the real world examples of applied socialist theory across the globe and it would also cover how depending on what it is and the nation, we could see zero private industry with complete gov. control or gov. ensured but contracted to private industry or both exist.
You are a word salad, a Kamala Harris. You do not understand what Socialism is, just admit it- instead of bobbing and weaving, talking absolute zero sense in long sentences!
Also, Nazis were not Fascist, and cannot be, by definition- that would be like calling a Protestant a Catholic.
My light bulb takeaway from this is towards the end: “Marx’s utopia ignored ecology.”
Brilliant contemporary analysis
I think that's the only real criticism of Marxism. It also happens to be a criticism of capitalism.
Keen is obviously an intellect. But he's got an arrogance, an over confidence. Some of his claims seem overly bold.
Early Soviet Union had a capitalist stint (the new economic policy)
based
We are doing this again. Its crazy.
Are you another son of a South African diamond mine owner?
This guy lost me at the 12 min mark.
Capitalism is a mode of economic production. It is mass production in it's most basic form. Scarcity in capitalism is different from actual scarcity under past modes of production. In capitalism labor theory of value is instumental in determining value not simple supply versus demand. A commodity that costs more to produce than it's actual practical use value is not produced. So you have cheap mass produced back scratchers made of bamboo or plastic and not hand crafted jewel encrusted devices that cost a fortune for simple mundane tasks.
@@theprinceofcrows8691 He didn't lose me in terms of understanding. He lost me when he said we've crashed into a wall with capitalism. No mention of crony capitalism. We don't have true capitalism. Everything is regulated by government. You can barely get away with running a lemon aid stand without someone from the state getting involved.
Capitalism is the natural state we operate in. Its cooperation. its voluntary trade. Its basically the black market. Which, by the way, is what always pops up under any system when the government becomes too involved.
@@bhosterman You are blurring the lines between multiple facets of political economy and misconstruing them with the capitalist mode of production. Those are important fundamental distinctions in economic terms. Capitalism is defined by the way it produces the goods and services for the world to use but the world has always had trade and economy. You need to get a deeper understanding of what constitutes economics as a whole to understand the differences between present and past modes of production to grasp what defined capitalism in particular.
What he means is that capitalism has already hit it's limitations in terms of how it can continually reproduce itself without extreme chaos and the things you say aren't capitalism are the only things keeping it with the mere appearance of being functional. If you cut those strings it would implode of it's own size and weight. It is the price for continuing a mode of economic production that has outlived its positive growth period as a productive part of our society like other modes before it. It is just the life cycle of modes of production.
Capital now requires these constant manipulations, austerity, shock therapy, government involvement, fiscal monetary policies, constant tinkering, geographical solutions to rising incomes, and other things like wars, regime changes, illegal immigration, mass migration, control over trade routes and resources to keep it where it can maintain the necessary compound growth rate which gets exponentially larger as each year passes and gdp continues to grow by at least a 2% compound rate or it goes into crisis. Basically, capital is on artificial life support and what you call true capitalism is just a ideological fantasy that never existed after the first few decades of the industrial revolution if it even existed at all. It is the lie they convince us of to keep people believing in it as a system but it has never been possible to create the capital they hold up as "true capital" because of how capital develops of it's own accord.
That just helps them use you to abuse the power structure to suck more and more wealth out of society and across the globe. To keep their firm and total control over the masses that they depend upon to keep their lifestyle. That is why he said that and he recognizes we hit the wall long ago but kept going anyway like Wild E Coyote running off the edge of a cliff. They are playing for time and don't have a fix and eventually the forces of gravity does the rest. That is why the world is in the crazy state of affairs it is in. Not because of insufficient binary gender norms, state interventionism, or a great replacement. It is because the system has followed the cycle of all past modes of production and it has become the fetters that hold back the natural development of human history. We are due for a change and soon China will reach the same crossroads as we have because they are developing at light speed and are the only way they have kept this going this long.
@@bhosterman Oh and just to clearly illustrate my point a market or "black market" is a means of circulating and distributing goods and commodities, they are not an economy by themselves or a mode of production. These distinctions and individual components that form a whole economy are critical if you are to understand how a political economy actually functions. I know Rothbard and libertarians fail to recognize that distinction in their literature but that is part of the problem with such falsehoods. You cannot have a black market without a mode of production to actually produce goods for sale or trade. Stop wasting your time with that garbage and put your time and energy into solving more important problems.
The question is - why do we have to innovate and what has all this innovation gotten us? Ecological systems are collapsing, humans are burning through earth's resources faster than earth can renew them, climate change, etc. It seems that innovation has cost us more in the long run than we'll gain.
Turn off your device then
@@laa6549 dam you I was going to tell him that
Dude. Innovation has saved tens of millions of people from extreme poverty misery and death. God damn this is misguided thinking of a privileged person. Stop utilizing the planets natural resources and watch how miserable and chaotic the world will become it will be awful for millions of people
The problem is equating capitalism with innovation. Capitalism only awards that which increases profit. This includes everything from paying workers less, using cheaper but not necessarily safer manufacturing methods, advertising that compels people to buy products or feel left out, paying off politicians to avoid costly taxes or other expenses or barriers to higher profits, but does not include innovation as an actual feature.
Innovation is born of the human drive to improve one’s living conditions. Exploration, scientific inquiry, research and development, all these endeavors have been historically backed by public funding. Take the iPhone. Every piece of technology that went into it had been developed previously by DARPA or other entities, with Apple’s innovation being to market the product as top of the line and exclusive. And that’s what capitalism is all about, doing anything you can get away with to make that all important profit.
@@russellharrell2747 Capitalism rewards those that provide goods and services that others want. That's why it's called a "free-market". We are all individuals and get to make individual choices. This is the natural state of man.
The way he is trying to make the Nazis look less Socialist is despicable. Public direction is nothing but an euphemism for public ownership, the companies were allowed to run "privately" as long as they ran exactly the way the state told them to.
The man endorsed Corbyn, just saying..
"an euphemism"
@@shane7051 Ok I used the wrong article.. Not a native English speaker.
@@AtomicMushroomz Why? Because only native English speakers can be right?
You don't know the first thing about business conditions and state control of private business during the nazi period. Educate yourself and stop substituting actual knowledge with youtube political diatribes and political indoctrination. Your fantasy is a delusion.
It's a fast track to hell
🤣
Religion rots your brain
I sell caravans and I wanna sell him one
So Mars will become a commie planet?
Claims about how socialism would/should/could work are just fan fiction.
socialism is the unification of political and economic power. it's that simple.
I've head that used to describe something else.
Really young people like socialism. Really old people like socialism. Really poor people think they like socialism. Everyone else in between makes all the money that makes the world turn and prefers capitalism. Seem right to me. Just all depends on who benefits more.
Forgot about sick people.
@@brynlpz83 yep they all like social programs as well.
He’s incorrect. He’s describing state capitalism. Marx wrote about the "Withering away of the state". How can you say Marx supported state ownership of production, if he also wanted the state to disappear? Also, if state ownership = socialism, then what is communism?
Socialism = workers own the means of production. Not the state. Not capitalists.
The only part of any buisness that anyone wants is the profit.
The socialist owns the means and therefore claims the profit, the fascist directs the means and therefore claims the profit.
The capitalist takes the risk and therefore claims the profit
The “socialist” in your example would be the Proletariat by the Socialist’s philosophy. The workers, by the definition of the Capitalist or the Fascist. In either latter philosophy the Capitalist or Fascist must extract surplus value from the Proletariat via exploitation in order to function.
This isn’t my advocacy of Socialism, but merely Marx’s accurate observation of an objective reality. Though, Fascism didn’t exist while Marx was alive.
The only hope the young generation have to prosper is the free market and its balancing effects. Socialism is not a system that will benefit young ambitious people. Socialism mainly benefits unproductive people, very large corporations and government officials. If you want to prosper rely on yourself and support a system that does not expropriate your efforts to those who have done nothing to deserve it
so mars' economy and "progress" will eventually be stagnated. LOL.
why would why work hard if we get the same shit size bunker.
This guy Keen is very hard to follow and doesn't have any real-world examples of these theories actually working. He sounds like an academic lost in the fantasy world of academia.
Do you love Peter Schiff, Ray Dalio, Michael J. Saylor, and Elon Musk?
@@davidlewis5737 I don't know who the first three are but I think Elon Musk certainly has an impressive list of accomplishments. I do think of Musk as someone living in the real world as opposed to the "fantasy world" of academia.
he lost me at " that's how i think it'd be with our first colonies on mars...."
people are broken, their minds & emotions, look at war poverty crime addiction violent exploitation, broken people break other people.
there's no way u can over populate & eff up one planet & think the answer is on another planet.
just 500 yrs ago nation states with sailing fleets were the spacex of their day, taking trade from one continent to the next, big boom as resources were drained in one territory & moved on to the next, plowing up DESTROYING NATIVE LIFE deep & wide.
that model is only being mentally re-projected, sci-fi style.
meanwhile, CLEAN WATERs, pumped from aquifers, are going be run out of human reach before they JUST RUN OUT.
yeah, industry+population=AN INDUSTRIAL SIZE PARASITE.
if ur on board with that, & don't want to look at the inner landscape, human consciousness, or lack therof, causing all the imbalance, then ur mind is still in the comic book stage,
playing with rocket ship toys. Musk is still in the playing with toys stage, sure he has the biggest shiniest fastest toys, but has his consciousness evolved past 1950s sci-fi materialist utopian dreams?
how much "more more more " would be "needed " by any spiritually balanced human being?
when is enough enough?
how many people do we keep producing, until there is standing room only? like Reagans idea (not originally his) that if aliens attacked, humanity would unite to fight the common enemy.
that'd be like fooling ur children with tales of the boogeyman, to get them to temporarily behave, that may have been a transition phase similar to what was taught by early churchianity.
why not teach the kids how to not be a-holes to each other by living/being the example?
because we react to our THOUGHTS, imaginary threats created of the ego, by the ego & for the ego, AND are not in control of our emotions & egoic minds, we are being taken for a ride by believing what gets served to us via egoic thinking, imagery & fears.
sure, send a probe to mars, but don't for gods sake explore why we divorce, can't communicate WITHIN our families, neighborhoods, or sit still, be at peace WITHIN OUR OWN BODIES, quiet our thinking, STILL the voice(s) in OUR OWN HEADS?
Socialism is here confused with communism. 😂
Socialism and communism are really different.
Nope, the problem is he doesn't explain it very well. Socialism is basically a stepping stone from capitalism to communism. As Steve explains, socialism is indeed defined as the means of production owned collectively. That's pretty much the main specification.
Communism is a continuation of this, where there is a collective ownership of ALL property as well as means of production. So you can see that communism is essentially a progression of socialism.
they are both cancer
@@alleras46 Good job. Well described.
“You will own nothing and be happy” lol
Just out of curiosity, how do you feel about socialism and/or communism?
I personally think the only way that Marxism works is when we (the worlds population) lives in abundance of goods, energy, necessities etc. maybe this century, maybe next century. Who knows. I’m not sure though. I still think the idea of private property is a good thing.
No, you are the one who's absolutely confused. The interviewee is right. Communism is stateless, classless and moneyless, so it has never actually existed. Nor that it could ever exist, of course, it's an utopia, a pipe dream. What has existed, and exists, in Cuba, North Korea, etc, is socialism, REAL socialism.
He likes Elon? Oh no not as smart as I thought
Social benefits are socialism, and it fits his definition quite perfectly - public ownership of the means of production; what else is the idea of providing everybody equal start, out of publicly owned resource surplus?
When the government owns the means of production it also owns the individual, you are required to be 100% subservient or you don't have a job, I know because I lived it myself, communism kills the human spirit.
Absolutely.
Almost 15 minutes to say "cancer"
Every socialist program we have is flat broke ! Social security, Medicare, medicaid, public employees pensions and on and on.
He talks about socialism then gives us examples of Russian communism?
That wasn't communism, that was socialism, real socialism.
@@polaristrans so explain how most of Europe is considered socialist in modern terminology when it is a mix of capital/ socialism and not like communist Russia or China where state owned everything. I get you are trying to get to the bottom of Marx but things have evolved since his day to a hybrid term for socialism. Keen goes on to say pure capitalism his already gone through a brick wall ( as in unfettered neoclassical) and that a form of social/ capital balance will appear aka modern socialism not the pure communism that ended up as just a failed system as neoliberalism. Add context instead of trying to prove how smart you are in academic purism that never translates to the real world.
@@iananderson6705 Because that is Not socialism by any means. That is social democracy. Europe is not socialist by any means. That's capitalism with strong welfare networks.
@@iananderson6705 Neither the USSR, nor China, Cuba, NK, were ever or have been communist. They are socialist countries.
@@polaristrans okay debating an idiot. Bye
Steve Keen is confused. He is explaining communism. Socialism is government giving incentives to business to make that business do what the government wants. It's also allocating revenues to provide "free healthcare". Socialism exists everywhere, so does capitalism. Countries may have more of one over the other. Socialism is NOT government ownership of property, that's marxism / communism. Nazism was most definately socialism, they gave enormous incentives to businesses and also gave huge benefits to workers. Hell, they even paid for workers vacations early on.
I thought the same. Aren't we still allowed to own our stuff in socialism? Communism is the one where the government owns everything & our asses. Sad.
Nope, the problem is he doesn't explain it very well. Socialism is basically a stepping stone from capitalism to communism. As Steve explains, socialism is indeed defined as the means of production owned collectively. That's pretty much the only specification.
Communism is a continuation of this, where there is a collective ownership of ALL property as well as means of production. So you can see that communism is essentially a progression of socialism.
@@alleras46 thank you for explaining 🙏🏼🙏🏼
No, he's not confused at all. He's absolutely right. Communism is stateless, classless and moneyless, so it has never actually existed. Nor that it could ever exist, of course, it's an utopia, a pipe dream. What has existed, and exists, in Cuba, North Korea, etc, is socialism, REAL socialism.
Actually, what you described is a liberal democracy. This is where the state is allowed to run certain aspects of society like the military, healthcare, education etc. This is what most European countries have in place.
This guy is talking about communism, not socialism.
Nope look up the definition of socialism.
@@nosajraboin5090 There are many definitions of socialism because there are many different levels of socialism. Idealistically, socialism is basically people in a society pooling their resources for the benefit of that society. The levels at which they do this should depend on the people of that society.
socialism means, the government take your money, and decide for your where to spend your money.
Good Lord a world without innovation, sounds miserable and boring AF. Homies can't even capitalise on their own creativity/IQ.
I get the social justice & anti-greed aspect of socialism but shouldn't people be rewarded for innovation?? And if I make an innovative contribution to my community, I'd like to think I've earned my bigger bunker. Lol. I'll shut up now and let the smart people talk. 🧃
Dude, capitalism is not innovation. The space race and all byproduct of the cold war are the result of research funded by the government. Also, more than 60% of US research fund is still public money.
@@LeonardoGPN oh you're right I forgot about the cold war. But wasn't that innovation driven by non-economic (≠ideological) competition rather 💰competition? Or are the lines blurred there?
At worst you get less/slower innovation,.. the scientific research doesnt stop with socialism. You can argue it can be even better because it isn’t tied to private profits
@@costasrex476 you're right we still get innovation out of Scandinavia/Canada. Idk why i kept thinking of some dystopian situation. Maybe my imagination got the beat of me. Thanks 🙏🏼🙏🏼
@YourA Towel! Please find a more innovative way to disagree with with me ☕