Zimbabwe's experience with kicking out the white farmers and seizing their land for redistribution.

submitted by Chipit from (i.redd.it)

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[–]h5e4ah45erth 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

Local economies prosper

Depends what you mean "prosper". In terms of labor to production, it's just not true, societies with higher ratios of debt (or another way to put it, more capital per risk) generally grow faster, and the result of that growth is more production per unit of labor. Because what debt represents it the willingness for those with wealth to lend it to risky projects. If you have no debt, what you really have is a wealth-hoarded society. Maybe it can exist at small scales, when wealth is scarce in the first place, but in the long term, hoarded wealth is wealth not invested.

Hence the inevitable transition of anarchist to "tankie": if we can't trust the rich with wealth, we need a council of councils to Democratize it. And the opposition will be executed.

[–]Tom_Bombadil 2 insightful - 5 fun2 insightful - 4 fun3 insightful - 5 fun -  (2 children)

A growing economy is not universally positive.

In terms of labor to production, it's just not true

Name a mother, child or grandparent that concerns themselves with "labor to production".

This is a metric of greed, and exploitation. If forces people away from their families.

Many people long for the good old days when parents weren't both forced into the work force by those who were concerned with "labor to production". Or other sociopathic goals.

Economics only accounts for financial transactions.

Every other human factor is considered an "externallity" and is ignored.

Modern economics is nonsense in practice. The theories don't work on real life applications.

It's predicated on the idea that individuals act solely out of greed and are self interested.
It's ludicrous.
People care about each other, and are typically kind to strangers.

Every real life circumstance is considered a "special case", and the economic "rules" don't apply.

This is because the "approved" theories are only supported by the academic funders, donators, and award manufacturers; who have a strong economic interest in projecting a certain world view to the public.

It's essentially propaganda.

[–]AnarchySpeach 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

It's predicated on the idea that individuals act solely out of greed and are self interested.

Because many people are. Most of them put themselves into positions of power. From the asshole manager at a Target who loves his job bossing people around to the politician dancing with a nuclear football.

and are typically kind to strangers.

Only to the extent society allows them to be. External factors force even the kindest of people into doing horrible things to others for self-preservation.

For many of us a roof over our heads, food, and water, and we'd be alright. That limitation is fine when you have a farm away from town. Not when you're stuck in a city where everything costs money.

[–]Tom_Bombadil 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I don't necessarily disagree, although we may disagree on the extent.

Situational/social pressures make people act contrary to their personal values. The corporate structure forces people to harm others, or find work at another corporate plantation if they take issue with .

The farmer runs his own operation, so he has the personal flexibility to act morally. Similar tendencies apply to those who are fortunate enough to work for corporate plantations with more ethical corporate cultures.

In spite of this, a small number of sociopaths/psychopaths can quickly destroy morality within the corporate structure.

This outcome appears to have been designed-in to corporate legal structure, as senior leadership is legally required to maximize profit.