Galt's Gulch

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  • Posted by Rex_Little 8 years, 11 months ago
    The problem is that in real life, there are people with the ability of Dagny but the political/ethical beliefs of James.
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    • Posted by $ hash 8 years, 11 months ago
      You do realize that Dagny was operating on incorrect premises throughout the book? Till the end when she joined the strike. Hank and Dagny represent, in the book, exactly those people of extraordinary productive ability but incorrect ethical premises. That's why they are Galt's real adversaries, not the looters and moochers.
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      • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 8 years, 11 months ago
        Yes but she was worth saving. No comparison to Gates.
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        • Posted by $ hash 8 years, 11 months ago
          Yeah, I didn't mean to imply any comparison to Gates who is more in the Jim Taggart / Orren Boyle category.

          I just meant to point out that a lot of the actually productive people are misguided in a similar way to how Hank and Dagny were - thinking that it's better to fight to fix the system rather than to abandon it.

          It's always better to escape from any society that is premised upon enslaving you and to maximize your own freedom, even if that means dealing with various challenges that will come up.
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      • Posted by $ jbrenner 8 years, 11 months ago
        When Gates, Buffett, and now Larry Ellison promise to give away their fortunes late in their lives, they are every bit as much Galt's adversaries. By doing that the poor will never feel the pain of their poor judgment until after Galt is old enough to not be able to capitalize on his productive years.
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  • Posted by peterchunt 8 years, 11 months ago
    A person like Gates is not an economist. His talents lie in other directions, so his comments on such things as corporate tax rates have zero validity. He should be applauded for what he did to build Microsoft, but besides dropping out of Harvard, looks like he didn’t take economics 101.
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  • Posted by strugatsky 8 years, 11 months ago
    Follow the money, especially with Gates. Of course, he is happy with the current crony-capitalist / socialist system - he has a monopoly. The government is his partner. Gates, and Microsoft, for that matter, have never created any technology. What they did create was a monopolistic empire by buying where they could, steal where they could not, and having the government act as their lieutenant with those that resisted. When you have a monopoly, what difference does it make how high the tax rate gets? You raise prices to compensate, while those same barriers keep the competition at bay. For Gates, it’s a marriage made in heaven. As for his “charitable” work in Africa – let’s not be so naïve – he’s buying Africa.
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    • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 8 years, 11 months ago
      Sad part is when you put together the best of capitalism a financial system with the best of what socialism was supposed to be (and it is not a financial system) You get the best of both IF you can stay away from the worst. Countries like Sweden, Switzerland, New Zealand and now China (the largest capitalist nation in the world or close to it) are edging toward that goal while countries like Russia, England and the US are running in the opposite direction - not together - int three opposite directions. The unions have shot their wad yet there is room for another version. The US has turned to a financial and physical cycle of repression. Russia is in the midst of their Wild Wild East as they struggle to experience a compressed form of historical development. Three times the USA showed the way then failed to follow it. When the great struggle of the Socialist Century of Wars is over - since it spilled into the next one I'd bet cash money on the ascendency of China into a democratically chosen Republic mixed with middle kingdom mandarinism and their present party's Gung Ho slogan which means move forward together harmoniously, winning the top spot world wide. Their twin assets of population and education hampered by not enough raw materials and not enough food production capability make them the Japan of the 21st Century.If they also don't choose the wrong path as did England, the USA and quite possibly Russia.

      Easy for me to say. I've been there and am no longer hampered by the name a better place fallacy. That place no longer exists.
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      • Posted by strugatsky 8 years, 11 months ago
        Putting the best of capitalism and the best of socialism together is like... a glass half full of sugar and half full of shit. Any may you mix it, it still smells the same...
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        • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 8 years, 11 months ago
          So how are you going to pay for what society demands and WILL vote for. Socialism failed. It only presented the problem. Strike one. Capitalism which has alway been under government control was, initially the tool of the wealthier classes who cared not a whit for the general pubic. Strike Two. it's all in how you view it. Unfortunately all the naysayers have yet to propose an alternative that can do better IF citizens control government. Have to open your mind a little bit. The origin of socialism was based on 'bridging the chasm between those few who owned everything and the many who did all the work.'' The failure was in their adopting the very ways they were supposedly against including a fairly closed ruling class who viewed the public as cannon fodder and baby factories.

          Your turn. Present an alternative. Notice I said best of. You have to provide your own shit which is decidedly not the best of. A self fulfilling prophecy or view of history.

          Have a nice day it took me fifty years to figure it out. But absent the looters, moochers, grubbers, warlords and witch doctors and the defeatists?

          Who knows maybe one day a few thousand generations from now what is possible.
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          • Posted by strugatsky 8 years, 11 months ago
            The whole point of capitalism is that is not a tool of the wealthier classes. If it is a true, pure capitalism, not the crony type that we have had in the 20th century. And I really don't want neither the capitalists, nor the socialists, and least of all the government, to care a whit for me. I want them all out of my life. Once you allow others to care for you, or rather, submit to others caring for you, they will care for you in the ways that they think you need to be cared for. Save me, please, from such care. The failure of socialism was not in the adaptation, or implementation, but in the flawed and corrupt logic used to justify the basic premise of socialism, which is against human nature. Any and all implementations will not work because of the flawed foundation.

            You want an alternative - it's rather simple: privatize everything except the very top level part of the legal system (Supreme Court; maybe one or two levels below) and national defense (and I would argue that even parts of the defense can be privatized). Will there be taxes? Sure, but minuscule compared to what we pay now. And this part I am borrowing from Robert Heinlein: Have every law periodically reviewed and put to a vote - if 2/3 of the voters do not support it, get rid of it. A very rational assurance against the government bloating of it's own volition. Yes, I know I'm dreaming, but you asked!
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            • Posted by $ MichaelAarethun 8 years, 11 months ago
              Just the answer I was hoping for. I ran into your first comment just last night in a different manner. From an old Japanese Shinto based saying. What do you get if you mix clean water with dirty water - Two cups of dirty water.

              So now I have to rephrase my intent which was the best of capitalism with the best intents of socialism and the former will be far easier than the latter.

              2/3rds is it possible. Let''s see half do not register and half of those don't bother to vote. YES it is possible. Already being done.

              Well hell if I can wade or be guided through the murk and mire...

              My basic premise though mis-stated still stands.

              Capitalism in it's best form produces the wealth needed for society to do as it wishes individually or in groups and therein the golden rule applies.

              The carrot used to draw people into 'flawed'' socialism which was just another version of feudalism under a an aristocracy of one description or another were the goals of individuals with certain agreed on caveats and parameters. Boiled down it's yes we need some government but not at the cost of sacrificing freedoms on a permanent basis. The answer certainly lies with the 75% and not with the 8 or 9 percent of the voting one quarter nor with the flawed system that allows less than ten percent of the nation to dictate to the majority.

              Now to shorten it up without losing value.l

              Thank you for the assist.

              PS I still think Bill Gates and company are guilty of conspiracy to defraud along with whomever is receiving payoffs.
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              • Posted by strugatsky 8 years, 11 months ago
                Capitalism builds wealth not because it exploits workers, is heartless, etc. It builds wealth because it is an equitable system. As such, it allows for incentives for people to perform at their best capacity, mentally and physically. Socialism, on the other hand, is attractive to those that do not see beyond their noses (the majority) because it promises them something that others have. And the people are too stupid to connect the dots and realize that socialism also promises to give away what they have. While doing that, regardless of intentions or proclamations, socialism always kills incentives to be productive – why, after all, when someone else can bring the bacon? Any amount of socialism injected into any society will metastasize and eventually kill the host. Treat it, along with its promises of “fairness” as a cancer – the sooner it is removed, the better. This includes most elements of any government, for the pus is most vile in the center.
                As to Gates, two anecdotes for you – back in the early days of DOS (mid-80’s), Microsoft DOS was one of the competing versions and was generally rated inferior to DR DOS. When MS released the first versions of Windows (3.x), which ran on top of DOS, Windows was designed to test for the version and sometime after detecting DR DOS it would crash with a message to call MS customer service. The rep was instructed to ask if the customer used DR DOS and to “inform” the customer that DR DOS had “bugs” and it should be replaced with MS DOS. DR DOS sued MS; it took 10 years to win the lawsuit (for an undisclosed amount), while MS monopolized the market. Second story – back in the early days of pc’s, Apple spend a fortune giving away free computers and software to schools in an effort to get the students used to Apple products and then request them from their future employers. Then, MS has the well-publicized Internet Explorer anti-monopoly lawsuit. MS lost the suit and, as is well known, was hit with a $1B penalty! What is less well known, is that $900M of that was for MS software (at retail prices) to be delivered to schools and $100M for installation of that software! Goodbye Apple…
                There is an old fable that goes like this – the forest animals put a Pike on trial. The Pike was accused of being a very bad, mean, selfish fish. She ate other fishes, babies and children and mothers all alike. Many animals offered testimony, one after another. Unanimous – the Pike was bad, mean and guilty. And it was sentenced to death, by drowning in the river…
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