[Flames Draft Watcher]

Originally posted by Flame Of Liberty@Apr 21 2005, 12:17 PM

What detriment? Also, who is to say that pure focus on the bottom line is the only way to go? There are companies/people who do not measure success purely in terms of money. But even if they do, it’s their money and they are (should be) free to focus on whatever they want (as long as they don’t aggress against other persons property). I don’t see that as a problem, maybe you should clarify why you see that as a problem.

I've found that when money is the bottom line (which capitalism promotes IMO) that things like artistic creativity, variety, beauty, regard for the welfare of others, regard for the environment, regard for workers tend to be de-emphasized. Efficiency, taking shortcuts, cutting costs are emphasized. Obviously not in all cases but I think it's an easily notable trend.

One can easily see this when I look out my window in downtown Calgary. I'm confronted with boring architecture, small and cramped working environments (cubicles), offices with no sunlight, polluting machines on every street. I deal with people who work ridiculous hours in order to maintain a lifestyle that advertising and society (by providing examples of what success is and giving these examples in the form of idols like movie stars, athletes, etc) has brainwashed them into thinking they need. Cookie cutter homes are another example of the lack of variety and beauty because it costs more to make something unique.

I'm sure you'll argue that some of these effects are not a by-product of capitalism but to me a lot of them go hand in hand.

I'm not sure what your theories say about the exploitation of workers in the 3rd world currently but I'd be interested to hear it. That's another example of exploitation in a capitalist system.

Companies are set up to indulge/exploit the worst in humanity. Why do I pay for parking? Because I'm too lazy to walk to work. Do I want to pay for parking? No.

You don't want to pay taxes presumably (if I'm understanding you right.) But things like parking are essentially a tax to us. No one wants to pay it. It would appear you just want to transfer some of the things we are forced to pay in tax (health care, law enforcement, roads, etc) to a voluntary tax that the majority of us would end up paying for anyway.

Anyways, these are some random and poorly assembled thoughts but hopefully that conveys some of my concerns about out capitalist society and it's current problems. It just scares me that somebody wants to see capitalist principles ruling even more areas of our lives than it already does. I don't see it as the ideal, I'm not sure what is but I'm searching...