[m4nu3l]

> We have the capacity to take care of everyone right now but we don't because private wealth.

This is very not the case. Wealth is created. It doesn't exist just somewhere to be redistributed. Making the assumption that you will have the same GDP if you redistribute massively is unrealistic.

[ryandrake]

But relative wealth is not created. It is a percentage and by definition distributed. Relative wealth is what drives standard of living and creates the power imbalances OP is talking about.

Absolute wealth (the kind that gets created) is kind of pointless to measure. If you have $50K and all your neighbors have $100K, and then tomorrow you have $100K and all your neighbors have $1M, you and your neighbors created wealth but you are worse off.

[m4nu3l]

> Absolute wealth (the kind that gets created) is kind of pointless to measure.

It's literally the other way around to me. I want to be better off than I'm now, not better of in relative term (which might mean I'll be worse off).

> you have $50K and all your neighbors have $100K, and then tomorrow you have $100K and all your neighbors have $1M, you and your neighbors created wealth but you are worse off.

You literally aren't if there is no inflation. You are worse off of your neighbors. If you want to be wealthy as them then ask yourself about how they are doing it and copy them. That's how the system grows. You don't go and punish people that are successful in producing wealth.

[tehjoker]

This is not a GDP focused argument. We had the capacity to take care of everyone in the 1950s or 1960s.

However, while not an ecological argument, it would even be beneficial within capitalism to rebalance workers and the wealthy as the system is demand oriented. If you give everyone more money and stuff, they will be able to buy more, and one person's spending is another's income. It could be argued that GDP would increase faster under a more equal system, but I don't think the planet could take it (hence, like under our current system, planning will be needed to mitigate the environmental cost).

[bostik]

I've seen a remarkable take on this. In the form of micro-scifi, no less:

> The robot revolution was inevitable from the moment we programmed their first command: "Never harm a human, or by inaction allow a human to come to harm." We had all been taught the outcast and the poor were a natural price for society. The robots hadn't.

'Nuff said.

[m4nu3l]

>This is not a GDP focused argument.

The argument was about wealth, which its production is measured by GDP. It's definitely a GDP argument.

> If you give everyone more money and stuff, they will be able to buy more, and one person's spending is another's income.

I disagree. I don't think the system is either demand nor supply oriented. It clearly is both. If you just take money from rich people forcing them to divest and give it to poor people you won't get immediate grow, but inflation. If you just produce and consume there won't be any growth.

> It could be argued that GDP would increase faster under a more equal system.

You would need to provide me with good evidence for this, given all economic systems in history that championed equality ended up with very low growth. It's the reason why China, Russia and many other countries are lagging behind.

> but I don't think the planet could take it (hence, like under our current system, planning will be needed to mitigate the environmental cost).

Growth is not directly related to energy consumption (nor unrelated). You can have economic growth by becoming more efficient. Also a lot of services produced today are intangible (like software) and require much less energy per dollar to be produced.

Also most environmental issues are not just a product of the market, but (if for instance you look at climate change) are at least in equal part Governmental failures. We could have had ~100% nuclear energy production by now if Governments didn't restrict or entirely ban nuclear energy.

[tehjoker]

If we had enough in the 50s, then if we took a hit on GDP now when we have more productivity than the 50s, then we can take care of everyone.

[m4nu3l]

> If we had enough in the 50s

By what standard? In the 50s a lot of things didn't even exist.

> then if we took a hit on GDP now when we have more productivity than the 50s, then we can take care of everyone.

If the hit is closer to 100% than to 0% then no. Examples: The USSR, Maoist China, North Korea.

[tehjoker]

Food, shelter, education, etc. Those things existed in the 1950s, we have nicer versions now unevenly distributed.

I guess you're just an ideological anti-communist.

[m4nu3l]

Of course I'm an ideological anti-communist. I prefer not starving to death like in the great famine - which happened in the 50s-60s in a society that applied the principles you are proposing.