Assertion:

Capitalism's main focus is economic growth, which proponents claim will lead inevitably to the prosperity of individuals.

Socialism's main focus is the prosperity of individuals, which proponents claim will lead inevitably to economic growth.... See More

Opponents criticize socialism because socialist economies don't grow as quickly as capitalist economies. This is true. Because that's not the main point of socialism.

Opponents criticize capitalism because capitalist economies have greater disparity between the rich and the poor and fewer people overall prosper. This is true. Because that's not the main point of capitalism.

Discuss.

Capitalism's main focus is protection of private property and individual liberty. Economic growth is the goal of governments that attempt to manipulate the free market to produce desirable political ends.

My solution: mixed economy.

There are some things that should be socialized and some things that shouldn't be. Health care should, ideally, be socialized. Everyone has the right to a long and healthy life.

Fast food restaurants on the other hand should not be socialized. People do not have an inherent right to junk food.

The problem of course lies in what should be socialized and to what extent it should be socialized.

I wouldn't necessarily lump individual liberty in with private property, there seems to be some debate on that matter.

From Wikipedia on Capiltalism:
Democracy

The relationship between democracy and capitalism is a contentious area in theory and popular political movements. The extension of universal adult male suffrage in 19th century Britain occurred along with the development of industrial capitalism, and democracy became widespread at the same time as capitalism, leading many theorists to posit a causal relationship between them, or that each affects the other. However, in the 20th century, according to some authors, capitalism also accompanied a variety of political formations quite distinct from liberal democracies, including fascist regimes, monarchies, and single-party states,[31] while some democratic societies such as the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and Anarchist Catalonia have been expressly anti-capitalist.[106]

While some thinkers argue that capitalist development more-or-less inevitably eventually leads to the emergence of democracy, others dispute this claim. Research on the democratic peace theory indicates that capitalist democracies rarely make war with one another[107] and have little internal violence. However critics of the democratic peace theory note that democratic capitalist states may fight infrequently and or never with other democratic capitalist states because of political similarity or stability rather than because they are democratic or capitalist.

Some commentators argue that though economic growth under capitalism has led to democratization in the past, it may not do so in the future, as authoritarian regimes have been able to manage economic growth without making concessions to greater political freedom.[108][109] States that have highly capitalistic economic systems have thrived under authoritarian or oppressive political systems. Singapore, which maintains a highly open market economy and attracts lots of foreign investment, does not protect civil liberties such as freedom of speech and expression. The private (capitalist) sector in the People's Republic of China has grown exponentially and thrived since its inception, despite having an authoritarian government. Private investment in Fascist states, such as Nazi Germany, greatly increased[citation needed], and Augusto Pinochet's rule in Chile led to economic growth by using authoritarian means to create a safe environment for investment and capitalism.

In response to criticism of the system, some proponents of capitalism have argued that its advantages are supported by empirical research. For example, advocates of different Indices of Economic Freedom point to a statistical correlation between nations with more economic freedom (as defined by the indices) and higher scores on variables such as income and life expectancy, including the poor, in these nations.

No, Communism's main focus is the prosperity of individuals, which proponents claim will lead inevitably to economic growth....

Socialism is an attempt to integrate the benefits of both into a coherent economic system, as capitalism's strengths are communism's weaknesses, and communism's strength are capitalism's weaknesses

This is debatable. Take the case of criminals. Not necessarily all of them, but some certainly don't, such as murderers, rapists, etc.

I disagree with both the Dark Hunter and Deckmaster. Both points require some form of continual human interpretation. For a hybrid economy, it is the interpretation of what should and shouldn't be socialized. I still contend that the core problem leading to the recent shape of the US economy is the sort of bastardized hybrid system we have. Companies are allowed to capitalize as they please with little or woefully inadequate regulation, leading to shortsighted business models which are destined to eventually fail because they aren't financially sustainable; and this is fine in the long run in pure capitalism, because then they do fail and the market equalizes. This isn't fine when someone then decides that the companies are too big to fail, and then a socialized safety net is enacted.

For the right to life, it is the interpretation of which crimes do and do not warrant the right to life, as well as the individual judging of each person to decide whether or not they are guilty. First, who are we to decide who is to die or not? At the core, what gives a court any more of an authority to decide this than a murderer who thinks the person they killed deserved the death penalty? Even if one could find some condition under which it was acceptable to take another non-consenting human life, a condition I do not think exists, over 130 death row prisoners have been set free because they were found innocent; what of the innocent people who weren't set free in time? It is impossible to know with absolute certainty if a person is innocent or guilty to a crime, and even more implausible if, like most criminals, they assert that they are innocent. Absolute certainty it the only acceptable terms under which one could even potentially sentence a person to death.

The "Too Big To Fail" thing is not socialism, rather, it is a product of advanced capitalism. Socialism prevents corporations from reaching that size in the first place, encouraging competition

Is that a troll?
Crony Capitalism is what you mean. In real laissez-faire capitalism any such action would be illegal. (as well as the interference leading up to and causing the crisis)

A few weeks ago I would have blamed it on political advertising, but I would like to take a moment to ask everyone to read Freakonomics and Superfreakonomics. They had some convincing evidence that political campaigns are not influenced by money nearly as much as most people think. Just ask Steve Forbes.

That doesn't mean in the least that they aren't a waste of money.

"Argumentation does not consist of free-floating propositions but is a form of action requiring the employment of scarce means; and that the means which a person demonstrates as preferring by engaging in propositional exchanges are those of private property. For one thing, no one could possibly propose anything, and no one could become convinced of any proposition by argumentative means, if a person’s right to make exclusive use of his physical body were not already presupposed. It is this recognition of each other’s mutually exclusive control over one’s own body which explains the distinctive character of propositional exchanges that, while one may disagree about what has been said, it is still possible to agree at least on the fact that there is disagreement. It is also obvious that such a property right to one’s own body must be said to be justified a priori, for anyone who tried to justify any norm whatsoever would already have to presuppose the exclusive right of control over his body as a valid norm simply in order to say, “I propose such and such.” Anyone disputing such a right would become caught up in a practical contradiction since arguing so would already imply acceptance of the very norm which he was disputing." Hans-Hermann Hoppe

And with that said Socialism in the full extent i.e. abolition of private property, is impossible outside of small groups. Why? Because economic calculation is impossible without market exchange and money which require private property. For example, A socialist planner may know how to make a car, they know how much steel aluminum and rubber they need, how many assembler hours, how many engineer hours etc. but without prices to calculate with, they will not know if they SHOULD make the car. That is, if the value of the car or output is worth more the sum of the values of the inputs, because without prices there is no way to determine the values of things to the economy as a whole. See Mises's Socialism or Human Action for more about economic calculation.

Why is this needed?



"Does someone need this car?"




That's the problem, you have it backwards. The purpose of Capitalism is to grow the economy, which will, in theory, lead to people getting what they need.

The purpose of Socialism is to get people what they need, which will, in theory, lead to the economy growing.

Well ask the Chinese and Russians why they did not "revolutionize" Hong Kong. Or why China used to buy Sears Catalogs. Or why the Soviets turned a blind eye to the black markets. Because they needed to know prices any prices, so they could calculate at least somewhat. Economic Calculation is what allows resources to be distributed to their most valuable use. Without the price framework, no calculation is possible, and you have incidents where the Soviet Union had to import grain from the West to prevent a famine, while their own grain lay unharvested.



Exactly do people want or need the car, there is no way for the planner to know. He has no way of telling whether the materials used would be better utilized making refrigerators or tractors or automobiles or anything else. In East German car works, economists calculate that the value of the steel and other materials used to make cars was more than the Cars being produced, in other words the quality of the cars was so poor that they would be more valuable as raw materials. Without prices and profit motives, quotas and gulags are the only method of motivating the managers. Soviets had a massive black market in American jeans and other clothing, because the quotas were in meters of clothing produced. Ergo, they only made really large clothing, not clothing people actually wanted to wear. Roofing nails are small and thin, but since the Soviet nail quotas were in Tons, the factories produced large heavy nails of poor utility, because that was the easiest way to meet the quota. The Market serves the wants of the Consumer, I'm not sure that Socialism serves anything but the leaders.

Sounds like an implementation error (there are a lot of those in Soviet Russia) rather than a basic error with the tenants.

I still explained the problem with the tenants, then offered examples of the problems.
"Exactly do people want or need the car, there is no way for the planner to know. He has no way of telling whether the materials used would be better utilized making refrigerators or tractors or automobiles or anything else."

But that's not really true. A centralized "ordering" system is one possibility that comes to mind.

That's still just the planners guessing blindly what things are needed, there is no way to check i.e. a profit/loss statement, that they are using resources effectively.

What does "profit" and "loss" matter in a system where such things are meaningless? You're using the inventions of capitalism to describe a wholly different system.

Your still not answering how the planners would know if what they were doing was actually the best use of resources. I wasn't applying Capitalism to Socialist Industry just explaining how capitalism does something that Socialism cannot. I think I misread you though by ordering system did you mean people ordering what goods they wanted? Or planners ordering goods to be made in order of importance?

I imagine he meant on a consumer ordering basis, like commissions. This works to not only assess the need, but in doing so theoretically eliminates excess. In capitalistic analysis, you either end up with more product than consumers, or more consumers than product. A commission based system ensures that both excess and deficiency are nominal.

Well if Omni meant that then what would the State do when say, everyone ordered everything possible. Suppose they have a limited number of goods they can order. What do you do when everyone orders a car? Everyone can't get a new car. How does the State decide who gets one? Lottery seems the most equitable method, but that isn't really going to work is it. Because some people do need cars, other people if they had to weigh the cost of a car versus the cost of the cheaper alternatives (bikes, Public Transport etc) plus the other goods and services they could consume would choose the latter option. Suppose they do have to choose between the "costs" of the goods they order. So if they chose goods less dear they could order more. Problem, how does one assign cost? Labor hours? Labor is not a homogeneous unit, the labor pool is divided between skill levels, and skill sets. Even amongst people of the same "skill" some people are naturally more talented than others, or more enthusiastic. How does the State decide to produce new goods? If no one is ordering something then they do not need it, and since it does not exist yet no one can be ordering it. So if no one needs it then there is no reason to produce something. So in short Socialism leads to stagnation decay and poverty, while capitalism allows a steadily increasing standards of living for everyone, not just the elite.

So how do you account for the steady decline in real wages over the last 30 years in America?

....(adding on to Omni) which has been an era of mass deregulation?

Also, what use is economic growth when such periods of intense capitalist-driven growth are followed by depressions? Growth has no value when it is not stable

Ever been to Pinochetian (Capitalist) Chile? (Socialist) Germany (or Sweden, or Iceland, or Norway...)?

The business cycle is caused by credit expansion through both inflation and fractional reserve banking. So the culprit is the Fed, and it's encouragement of fractional reserve banking. In early 2000s some banks were allowed to have reserve rates as low as 2%, because of Greenspan trying to end the dotcom crash and 9/11 recession, one of which was normal in a state of panic, the other was caused again by the inflation and credit expansion of the 90s. So sustainable growth is perfectly possible in a Capitalist system, just not an interventionist one.