Re:David Graeber has died
by notJim on Thursday September 03, 2020 @05:42PM
(#24369210)
From Wikipedia: "Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit". I looked around a bit to see if this is a contentious definition, but other definitions I found shared the key bit about private ownership of the means of production. If a private entity owns the means of production, why wouldn't that entity attempt to maximize its share?
[ Parent
| on HN ]
Re:David Graeber has died
by specialist on Thursday September 03, 2020 @08:14PM
(#24370370)
Why indeed.
Why would any employer pay anything more than the absolute minimum for wages? Or pay any taxes? Or properly dispose wastes? Or...?
What about capitalism states that maximizing profit must supersede all other goals?
I always thought the real point was that there was more to maximization than calculus really leads you to. It is trivial to attempt simple maximization, but very hard when you want to find maximized profits given social pressure, preparedness for the future, risk tolerance and a whole host of other issues. Maximizing profits don't necessarily need to be a simplistic mathematical approach to a very complex and atuo-correlated system.
Re:David Graeber has died
by specialist on Friday September 04, 2020 @08:54AM
(#24374457)
Exactly. You should be in charge.