If a socio-economic system incentives greed to the point where a person who is not greedy is literally unable to succeed, can you really say that greed is human nature?
Of course it is! Just like violence, murder, rape, etc., etc. We’re just better at handling some nasty parts of our nature than others. Especially because for the longest time incentivizing greed was leading to the betterment of the individual (and, accidentally, sometimes also the commune).
We punish murderers, but we don’t punish CEOs running a company to the ground for a short-term increase in share prices. Or, hell, look at US healthcare insurance companies - these people DO MURDER, but because it’s called different on paper, and brings profits, nobody is getting punished.
It’s self interest that fuels capitalism. The reason it has succeeded is that it takes advantage of this primal instinct. But obviously selfishness, while very motivating for an individual, does not magically add up to collective good. So you have to also have a plan for that, ideally funded by all the self interested wealth-getting. But if all you have is that collective good, and no offering for the instinct to serve self-interest, then all you have is a bunch of people standing around looking at each other, wondering who’s going to make it happen.
I’m in no way educated enough to give a definitive answer, but I feel like a “socialist-capitalist” hybrid would work wonders.
A system with Universal Basic Income, universal healthcare, universal housing (basically: all basic human needs covered 100% of the time regardless of circumstances) with incentives to get education, work, and earn money (for all the shiny cool things that UBI can’t cover), with a very strong grant/government investment system (replacing shareholders) to provide a non-malicious financial support for inventors/businesses.
All it takes for capitalism to work flawlessly is… checks notes… a fundamental change in human nature, where we no longer feel greed.
EZPZ. Best system ever designed!
(don’t tell anyone that this would equally make communism work)
If a socio-economic system incentives greed to the point where a person who is not greedy is literally unable to succeed, can you really say that greed is human nature?
Of course it is! Just like violence, murder, rape, etc., etc. We’re just better at handling some nasty parts of our nature than others. Especially because for the longest time incentivizing greed was leading to the betterment of the individual (and, accidentally, sometimes also the commune).
We punish murderers, but we don’t punish CEOs running a company to the ground for a short-term increase in share prices. Or, hell, look at US healthcare insurance companies - these people DO MURDER, but because it’s called different on paper, and brings profits, nobody is getting punished.
It’s self interest that fuels capitalism. The reason it has succeeded is that it takes advantage of this primal instinct. But obviously selfishness, while very motivating for an individual, does not magically add up to collective good. So you have to also have a plan for that, ideally funded by all the self interested wealth-getting. But if all you have is that collective good, and no offering for the instinct to serve self-interest, then all you have is a bunch of people standing around looking at each other, wondering who’s going to make it happen.
What’s your alternative system?
I’m in no way educated enough to give a definitive answer, but I feel like a “socialist-capitalist” hybrid would work wonders.
A system with Universal Basic Income, universal healthcare, universal housing (basically: all basic human needs covered 100% of the time regardless of circumstances) with incentives to get education, work, and earn money (for all the shiny cool things that UBI can’t cover), with a very strong grant/government investment system (replacing shareholders) to provide a non-malicious financial support for inventors/businesses.