good short read clarifying a common misconception
Does capitalism cause poverty? --- weforum.org/agenda/2015/08
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Forgive heavy-handed analogy: that analysis is on the level of saying major organ failure can't be attributed to cancer in one part of the body.
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Not saying capitalism in itself causes extreme poverty, but the argument he gives is not even on a relevant level of analysis.
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(It's also structurally similar to "They didn't do the National Socialism/Communism correctly," which is a telling form of self-absolving arg.)
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i agree he fails to note any of capitalism's shortcomings but it's hard to argue against the central premise that in places where capitalism is embraced poverty tends to decrease and avg standards of living tend to increase significantly
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You will notice that they tend to prefer certain metrics over others, and that they focus on the arithmetic mean over median.
Coincidence? No.
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Capitalism delivers unrivalled utility along a very narrow band of parameters.
The real kicker is in the externalities.
Much like communism, it would be an excellent system if not for some major structural flaws.
May be possible to upgrade and retrofit. We'll see.

