Debate: Capitalism vs. Socialism

[Vēritās]

Patrick Bet-David is a Right Wing businessman/entrepreneur who has a podcast and I've been watching some of his episodes lately and then this one caught my attention. It claims to be a "heated" debate with Richard Wolff, who is presumably one of the better known Socialists in America. After watching it, my first reaction is that this wasn't a "heated" debate at all, and seems to be a perfect example of how civil debating should actually take place.

PDB tends to use the same debating technique of calling his opponent very smart because it tends to encourage him to agree with him (i.e. "You're a smart guy so you already know this...") He does this all the time but he also tends to speak over his opponents while they're making crucial points.

PDB claims that monopolies can ONLY happen when the big bad government helps create them. That was the biggest WTF moment for me, because the opposite is mostly true. Government prevents monopolies and is virtually the only mechanism we have to prevent monopolies.

Anyway, lots of points to discuss if you watch the entire clip.

https://youtu.be/wj-zFgxCUnY?t=36

ETA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iov6jyfKtRc In this clip he is debating a Communist professor. I'm by no means a supporter of Communism, but what caught my attention the most was his claim that Stalin has gotten a bad rap over "murdering millions" of his own people through starving them to death. This guy argues that this has long since been debunked (not that millions starved but that it was the intention and fault of Stalin) but it has become such a staple in the history books that people just keep repeating it. When asked by PDB who did more for the people, Jeff Bezos or Joseph Stalin, he responded, "Absolutely it was Stalin." He then goes on to say that life expectancy in Russia before Stalin was 40 years but then that nearly doubled during Stalin because he provided thousands of doctors, hundreds of hospitals, etc and the quality of life among the people drastically improved. That's certainly something you never hear about, so I'm curious if this guy is legit and really does know what he's talking about or if he's just a crackpot.

[Vēritās]

A couple of things I take issue with is PDB's claim that everyone could become millionaires in a Capitalist system and that monopolies are the result of government intervention.

Sure, Government can help a company become a monopoly but a market that is entirely unregulated without any government intervention will naturally produce monopolies in every industry. This isn't even debatable anymore because we have too many examples of this happening over the past 50 years. Think of Walmart building in rural America putting Mom and Pop stores out of business by cutting their own prices below cost, and then once they're the only retail provider in sight, they jack the prices up again because they're the only choice the people have.

Also, this guy doesn't seem to understand that in a theoretical situation where EVERYONE has a million dollars in their bank account, this would mean the economic institution as we know it no longer exists, because there is no more working class. Millionaires don't pick vegetables, clean hotel rooms, work at Walmart, pave the roads, serve in the military, etc. The only reason people CAN become millionaires is because we live in a society where the working class provides for the rich. You can't name me one single millionaire who obtained his wealth all by himself. Most millionaires obtained their wealth by investing in real estate, usually homes that no existing millionaire would live in. They can't make money flipping homes to other millionaires because they're not interested in these homes for reasons other than to rent them out. And millionaires won't be renting their homes.

[Physics Guy]

People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.

[huckelberry]

People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.

member of the privileged class complaining about workers looking for better wages. yuk

[¥akaSteelhead]

Unfettered capitalism leads to corporate servitude. Unfettered socialism can lead to unproductiveness. The best answer is probably a blend of both. Oh look at what is occurring in Northern Europe.

[honorentheos]

Patrick Bet-David is a Right Wing businessman/entrepreneur who has a podcast and I've been watching some of his episodes lately and then this one caught my attention. It claims to be a "heated" debate with Richard Wolff, who is presumably one of the better known Socialists in America. After watching it, my first reaction is that this wasn't a "heated" debate at all, and seems to be a perfect example of how civil debating should actually take place.

PDB tends to use the same debating technique of calling his opponent very smart because it tends to encourage him to agree with him (i.e. "You're a smart guy so you already know this...") He does this all the time but he also tends to speak over his opponents while they're making crucial points.

PDB claims that monopolies can ONLY happen when the big bad government helps create them. That was the biggest WTF moment for me, because the opposite is mostly true. Government prevents monopolies and is virtually the only mechanism we have to prevent monopolies.

Anyway, lots of points to discuss if you watch the entire clip.

https://youtu.be/wj-zFgxCUnY?t=36

ETA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iov6jyfKtRc In this clip he is debating a Communist professor. I'm by no means a supporter of Communism, but what caught my attention the most was his claim that Stalin has gotten a bad rap over "murdering millions" of his own people through starving them to death. This guy argues that this has long since been debunked (not that millions starved but that it was the intention and fault of Stalin) but it has become such a staple in the history books that people just keep repeating it. When asked by PDB who did more for the people, Jeff Bezos or Joseph Stalin, he responded, "Absolutely it was Stalin." He then goes on to say that life expectancy in Russia before Stalin was 40 years but then that nearly doubled during Stalin because he provided thousands of doctors, hundreds of hospitals, etc and the quality of life among the people drastically improved. That's certainly something you never hear about, so I'm curious if this guy is legit and really does know what he's talking about or if he's just a crackpot.

It was an interesting video. I think it would have benefited from having outside questions posed as it seemed the points being made often went past one another in favor of reassertions of a prior held belief. The monopoly discussion is a good case in point. When Wolff outlined a simplistic but suitable argument that capitalism is systemically self-destructive due to the accrued advantages of success leading to the ability to set the price as a means of removing competition which results in eventual monopoly, Bet-David jumped to an erroneous conclusion about what Wolff meant from hearing capitalism described as being self-destructive. It was a blatant example of what I think often drove the majority of the discussion. Most other examples were more subtle than that one.

[Physics Guy]

I guess proletarians are just as inclined to conspire to raise their incomes, but I've always thought of Smith's conspiring fellow-tradespeople as CEOs forging oligopolies.