Socialism

[Chas]

An economics professor at a college made a statement that he had never failed a single student before, but had recently failed an entire class.
That class had insisted that Corbyn's vision of socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer.
The professor then said, “OK, we will have an experiment in this class on Corbyn's ideological plan”.
All grades will be averaged and everyone will receive the same grade so no one will fail and no one will receive an A…. (substituting grades for £ 's) something closer to home and more readily understood by all).
After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B.
The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy.
As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little.
The second test average was a D! No one was happy.
When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F.
As the tests proceeded, the scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.
To their great surprise, ALL FAILED and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great, but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed.

It could not be any simpler than that.

There are five morals to this story:
1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity.
2. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.
3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
4. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it!
5. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that is the beginning of the end of any nation.

 

[Bert]

I quite enjoyed that Chas. Thanks.

 

[Rob Cowell]

Conversely, another economics professor (one who actually looked up the definition of socialism) used a different educational analogy.

He randomly allocated tokens to a small percentage of the kids. Those with tokens got comfy seats, a new computer each and access to the internet. Those without shared a couple of books and a notepad, sitting on the floor. The professor would educate all the pupils for 10 minutes a day, but any pupils with tokens got an extra 2 hours tuition each day. The professor let them study for a week then take the test.

The next week all pupils were given the same access to information and education. They took a new test. And compared the results.

The moral of the story is beware of straw men and the people who use them.

 

[Chas]

Conversely, another economics professor (one who actually looked up the definition of socialism) used a different educational analogy.

He randomly allocated tokens to a small percentage of the kids. Those with tokens got comfy seats, a new computer each and access to the internet. Those without shared a couple of books and a notepad, sitting on the floor. The professor would educate all the pupils for 10 minutes a day, but any pupils with tokens got an extra 2 hours tuition each day. The professor let them study for a week then take the test.

The next week all pupils were given the same access to information and education. They took a new test. And compared the results.

The moral of the story is beware of straw men and the people who use them.

I have met Jeremy Corbyn and as a man I like him as a politician I don't.

 

[Deleted member 13129]

An economics professor at a college made a statement that he had never failed a single student before, but had recently failed an entire class.
That class had insisted that Corbyn's vision of socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer.
The professor then said, “OK, we will have an experiment in this class on Corbyn's ideological plan”.
All grades will be averaged and everyone will receive the same grade so no one will fail and no one will receive an A…. (substituting grades for £ 's) something closer to home and more readily understood by all).
After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B.
The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy.
As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little.
The second test average was a D! No one was happy.
When the 3rd test rolled around, the average was an F.
As the tests proceeded, the scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.
To their great surprise, ALL FAILED and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great, but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed.

It could not be any simpler than that.

There are five morals to this story:
1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity.
2. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.
3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
4. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it!
5. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that is the beginning of the end of any nation.

Mr Corbyn is wanting a fairer system for all rich and poor . The system as is today is some people I know are earning 500k plus a year and are paying the same tax as some one making 30k due to loop holes put in on purpose for the rich its no accident these loop holes are there , a lot of people don't work and get more money in hand outs and housing benefits go to bed at 3am and get up at 1pm get fat out of laziness and get disability perks and get a free brand new car free insurance and road tax and servicing , and are better off than a lot of those who do work , a real socialist system means no freeloaders everyone has to pull there weight by working until they reach pension age . There are many jobs these freeloaders can be doing in the UK cleaning graffiti in city centres , cleaning litter on country roads , dredging canals and rivers to help against flooding some areas suffer from , all these jobs and more the government can't afford to pay for because they are giving the Tax payers money to people to sit on there backsides and do nowt , thus pushing up the age for a pension to them that are working .

 

[Chas]

Mr Corbyn is wanting a fairer system for all rich and poor . The system as is today is some people I know are earning 500k plus a year and are paying the same tax as some one making 30k due to loop holes put in on purpose for the rich its no accident these loop holes are there , a lot of people don't work and get more money in hand outs and housing benefits go to bed at 3am and get up at 1pm get fat out of laziness and get disability perks and get a free brand new car free insurance and road tax and servicing , and are better off than a lot of those who do work , a real socialist system means no freeloaders everyone has to pull there weight by working until they reach pension age . There are many jobs these freeloaders can be doing in the UK cleaning graffiti in city centres , cleaning litter on country roads , dredging canals and rivers to help against flooding some areas suffer from , all these jobs and more the government can't afford to pay for because they are giving the Tax payers money to people to sit on there backsides and do nowt , thus pushing up the age for a pension to them that are working .

"Some people are earning 500k plus a year and are paying the same tax as some one making 30k", surely they are paying the same percentage of tax, not the same tax which means they are contributing a larger amount, or do you mean they should be penalised for earning a larger wage and have to pay a greater percentage? I refer to my original post, people would not have the incentive to earn more if it was going to be given to someone else.

 

[moggy1968]

Corbyn, the terrorists friend

 

[Deleted member 13129]

"Some people are earning 500k plus a year and are paying the same tax as some one making 30k", surely they are paying the same percentage of tax, not the same tax which means they are contributing a larger amount, or do you mean they should be penalised for earning a larger wage and have to pay a greater percentage? I refer to my original post, people would not have the incentive to earn more if it was going to be given to someone else.

Those who use loop holes are paying the same amount of tax as some one earning 30k and not the percentage .

 

[Iwan]

A very intelligent fella. Worth seeing the presentation through. Socialism... Naah!

 

[Rob Cowell]

I have met Jeremy Corbyn and as a man I like him as a politician I don't.

View attachment 145346

I haven't met him and think the same. I know this was sort of jokey but it's quite easy to pick apart a lot of political ideas without building straw men. The straw men are even easier to unpick and mean we lose reasoned criticism.

Likewise it would be a shame to call the country's leader a spineless, incompetent racist, because we might forget how she presided over a home office policy to forcibly remove British citizens from the UK and then threw Amber Rudd under a bus. Because Tory face saving is paramount and blaming everyone but themselves for their inability to lead the country through the mess they created without considering the consequences is about their only policy.

 

[chapel gate]

On the whole Corruption by persons in a position of wealth and privilege has been around since the beginning of time. We are lucky to live in a relatively speaking, pretty corrupt free country. Emphasis on relatively. Every profession has its perks, from builder to barrister. If for example every individual played by the rules so to speak, i doubt the average citizen would see any positive benefit in there lives financial or otherwise.
im not saying its right, but imo its better to concentrate on "your own game" than sometimes worry about how the other more privileged sections of society are playing theres. More often than not throught slighty envious eyes.
This isnt directed at anyone. Just an observation..

 

[Rob Cowell]

A very intelligent fella. Worth seeing the presentation through. Socialism... Naah!

I find it odd that socialism is dismissed by looking at the most extreme examples. Actually I don't find it weird, proposing something that isn't happening and then rubbishing it is much easier than addressing real issues. I don't think anyone is suggesting all production is placed in the hands of the state. But some, maybe transport and energy production could be taken out of the hands of other states, France and Germany predominantly (EDF, Deutsche Bahn, but also Abellio, Trenitalia, etc).

Its odd how rarely anyone tries to rubbish capitalism by saying Tories want all production be controlled by profit, and if that means pollution, reduced safety standards, child labour then so be it (although not having all that burdensome health and safety and silly working time directive stuff has been suggested as a benefit we will reap when we rid ourselves of our evil continental overlords).

I think the ideal will lie somewhere in between. The problem with broad-brush economic and political discourse is it will miss the sweet spot.

 

[moggy1968]

I find it odd that socialism is dismissed by looking at the most extreme examples. Actually I don't find it weird, proposing something that isn't happening and then rubbishing it is much easier than addressing real issues. I don't think anyone is suggesting all production is placed in the hands of the state. But some, maybe transport and energy production could be taken out of the hands of other states, France and Germany predominantly (EDF, Deutsche Bahn, but also Abellio, Trenitalia, etc).

Its odd how rarely anyone tries to rubbish capitalism by saying Tories want all production be controlled by profit, and if that means pollution, reduced safety standards, child labour then so be it (although not having all that burdensome health and safety and silly working time directive stuff has been suggested as a benefit we will reap when we rid ourselves of our evil continental overlords).

I think the ideal will lie somewhere in between. The problem with broad-brush economic and political discourse is it will miss the sweet spot.

It has happened, and nationalised industry was shit!!

 

[moggy1968]

IBecause Labour face saving is paramount and blaming everyone but themselves for their inability to lead the country through the mess they created without considering the consequences is about their only policy.

see, it works equally well whichever party you insert here, if any of the labour governments in living memory are anything to go by.
chapel Gate summed it up best

 

[Rob Cowell]

It has happened, and nationalised industry was shit!!

Poorly run industries are shit. The nationalised ones just drag on longer. Deutsche Bahn are German state owned. German trains seem pretty good. SBB is state owned, and Swiss trains are pretty well thought of. It must be more than just being nationalised that makes the service shit mustn't it?

Non state owned companies are doing a pretty good job of taking all our money. Many pay almost no tax in the UK, while employing people on minimum wage we all then have to help with working tax credits. Others are happy to profit from an educated work force we all pay for and again they put little or nothing back.

I think there's merit in both approaches.

 

[hopeless wanderer]

It has happened, and nationalised industry was shit!!

Shit it may well have been but it existed. The French just recently part privatised their largest shipyard to prevent ownership being transferred to the Italians. Germans produce steel in part nationalised industry that is obliged to use this home produced steel in domestic projects.
Everyone else is doing “socialism” to a reasonable degree and maintaining industries that have collapsed in the UK. The Americans (the epitome of capitalism) subsidised GM to the present day... where’s the British car industry ? They’ve just put in huge tariffs to protect their industries while we sold ours for a quick buck.
It’s easy to say “the unions criplled British industry” but when you transfer your economy from manufacturing to finance and allow banks free reign to lend money they don’t have, you get inflation then you have salaries that don’t equate to the cost of living (sound familiar)
There’s obvious flaws in the some of the media driven debate, take Labour and the giving away of “free stuff”
It’s inevitably mumbled by a generation that had free university education through grants and the lowly unskilled worker could buy a house with ease.

 

[Rob Cowell]

see, it works equally well whichever party you insert here, if any of the labour governments in living memory are anything to go by.
chapel Gate summed it up best

Yes it does. My point was about the banality of creating straw men. I'm sorry, I don't know what yours is.

 

[chapel gate]

I find it odd that socialism is dismissed by looking at the most extreme examples. Actually I don't find it weird, proposing something that isn't happening and then rubbishing it is much easier than addressing real issues. I don't think anyone is suggesting all production is placed in the hands of the state. But some, maybe transport and energy production could be taken out of the hands of other states, France and Germany predominantly (EDF, Deutsche Bahn, but also Abellio, Trenitalia, etc).

Its odd how rarely anyone tries to rubbish capitalism by saying Tories want all production be controlled by profit, and if that means pollution, reduced safety standards, child labour then so be it (although not having all that burdensome health and safety and silly working time directive stuff has been suggested as a benefit we will reap when we rid ourselves of our evil continental overlords).

I think the ideal will lie somewhere in between. The problem with broad-brush economic and political discourse is it will miss the sweet spot.

I agree the solution lies in the centre ground. Pick the best parts from each ideology. I think there is such a thing as british capitalism. We strictly adhere to the essence of capitalism and watch our great industries, institutions and inventions be raped by the rest of the world. Every other country indulges in some form of protectionism and uses capitalism to its advantages rather than its ultimate demise as we seem so intent on doing..

 

[moggy1968]

Yes it does. My point was about the banality of creating straw men. I'm sorry, I don't know what yours is.

My point is, this isn't a Tory thing, as Chapel Gate said, it's all about power and money, doesn't matter if they're red or blue, they're all interested in the same shit, power money and themselves.

 

[moggy1968]

I agree the solution lies in the centre ground. Pick the best parts from each ideology. I think there is such a thing as british capitalism. We strictly adhere to the essence of capitalism and watch our great industries, institutions and inventions be raped by the rest of the world. Every other country indulges in some form of protectionism and uses capitalism to its advantages rather than its ultimate demise as we seem so intent on doing..

OK, Chapel Gate, this is getting annoying now, your bloody right again!!
Capitalism creates business, but if your not careful it also creates division, imbalance, resentment and suffering. If we want a moral, tempered society, it has to be balanced with elements of socialism, like looking after the poor, the disabled, the sick, the elderly and the young. Like having a fair society, that doesn't mean everyone is the same, treated the same or lives the same, it just means that it's fair, people don't starve, but they are rewarded for their work, and their contribution. I don't agree with socialism, it doesn't work. I don't agree with capitalism either, it doesn't work. I agree with elements of both.