[TFYS]

So if you didn't build the house, no one would've and people would live on the streets? No, people need a place to stay and the house would get built even if renting was impossible. We would just figure out different ways to pool money to build houses. House prices would also come down if wealthy people couldn't store their money into land.

[DiffEq]

So, in the many thousands of years of men trying every which way…this has not happened. So, unless someone has found a better way capitalism is the best way so far.

[jamiek88]

What? Of course this has happened.

I grew up in a council house. I.e. a house created by pooled money in the form of taxes.

Houses must exist. Landlords are an inefficiency to be optimized out.

[DiffEq]

How many houses did investors build vs how many houses did the government build…from the money they actually took from somebody else? And which houses are nicer, safer and better maintained?

[loup-vaillant]

> How many houses did investors build vs how many houses did the government build…

Strictly speaking the answer is zero and zero. They use the money they have to have construction workers build the houses.

> from the money they actually took from somebody else?

Is this supposed to imply someone is taking money from others and the other does not? I know the view that government taxes is basically theft, and I think this view is ludicrous: citizen get that back in the form of infrastructure and public services, and in a functioning democracy it's basically their collective will that decided how to allocate that money. (How functioning the democracy really is is another debate.)

Investors on the other hand… well there are two kinds: those who worked for their money, and those who took it from workers. And it's a spectrum too, it depends how much of your income comes from your work, and how much comes from your possessions. Now I can guess most small landlords like yourself probably paid their houses with money they earned through actual work. Some even have constructed the houses themselves. But if that Second Thought video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1m7WmKJZyQ has any accuracy the majority of rented houses are rented by big landlords, and those definitely did not earn their money through their own work (the clerks that work under them do, but they don't own the houses and are paid a meagre salary, compared to the renting money they manage).

I can't speak for government constructed houses, but given the above, your average investor-owned house was constructed or bought with money that was taken from people working for the investor. (Well strictly speaking the worker creates value for their boss, which gives a salary in return, but there's always a difference between value created and salary returned. That difference is the exploitation/theft part. And I'm glossing over the fact that managing a company is valuable work unto itself.)

> And which houses are nicer, safer and better maintained?

Am I supposed to answer "the investor's houses"? A citation is needed for that answer, and it'd better control for when the house is build (construction norms tend to evolve over time), how much it actually cost, and in some cases who it actually cost. Suburbian houses may be nice for instance, but the car dependency and the unsustainable infrastructure costs definitely are not.

[pwdisswordfishc]

If you build your houses from money, they’re not going to stand for very long. Houses are built from bricks.

Though for what it’s worth, the government at least has the advantage that it can print its own money, so it doesn’t need to take it from somebody else, unlike investors.

[agalunar]

It's completely plausible that a nation with a wealth of natural resources but an economic system that treats people terribly could win a series of wars and establish its economic system as the dominant one in the world, and then use its power to maintain status quo.

A marketplace of ideas does not necessarily lead to the best outcomes, or even good outcomes.

Suppose the marketplace of ideas is an unregulated marketplace. Then the wealthy and powerful can use their wealth and power to determine the world that other people see, getting those people to mistakenly fight for things that help the wealthy and powerful.

But suppose it's kept a fair marketplace. Fairness is not natural – it's a human value that we have to actively maintain. But suppose we succeed. Even then, the marketplace may not select the best ideas, because people have emotional needs – like belonging to community – that will cause them to stubbornly reject good ideas. But we accept this because it's the only way for us to live with each other; if I want you to let me disagree with you, I have to let you disagree with me.* The price of intellectual freedom is very, very steep, even if it's worth it.

So I don't believe the fact that capitalism is dominant is good evidence that it's the best idea so far. In fact, I think we have little evidence of it at all.

* There are of course complications of the Popperian, paradox-of-tolerance sort, where we do have to fight to the death, so to speak. If someone repeatedly demonstrates an unwillingness to compromise or act fairly, they've left you the choice of letting yourself perish or eliminating them, which is a shitty situation to be in.

[hnfong]

> It's completely plausible that a nation with a wealth of natural resources but an economic system that treats people terribly could win a series of wars and establish its economic system as the dominant one in the world, and then use its power to maintain status quo.

FWIW, Adam Smith has argued that this is unlikely. The world seems to prove him correct.

That said I do disagree with the way GP's argues the point. While the dominant economic system is likely more effective at creating dominating economies, it's not a given that it is good at being fair. Shutting down discussion while claiming that "capitalism is the best so far" because nobody else has come up with an alternative reeks of willful ignorance. It's easy to believe something is the best if you don't actively look for alternatives and demand others to serve it to you on a silver platter.

[agalunar]

I was trying to be careful by writing "treats people terribly" rather than "treats its people terribly", having imperialist nations in mind, or "treats all people terribly", having class-divided societies in mind.

I didn't realize that Adam Smith had argued on this point, though! Thank you for letting me know.