Anarcho-Capitalism (Con) vs Democratic Socialism (Pro)

Thank you for challenging me to this debate. "Socialism is fairer than capitalism" What is your definition of fair in this context? Is it fair that Lebron James is a much better basketball player than me? And who is the determiner of what is fair? You? Me? James Franco? The government? Is the fact that Lebron James a better basketball player than me enough to give me the right to break his legs so that we are on equal footing? And you talk about how capitalism has put 1 Billion children in poverty. I'm frankly not even sure how to respond to that. Nothing has been proven better to rise people out of poverty than capitalism. Think about the industrial revolution. Never in history had there been such a dramatic size in the standard of living of human beings. It brought about the introduction of many labor saving devices, and things like factories, and cars. This was because of capitalism. And yes, by today's standards these conditions are horrendous, but understand that it was a big boost from before, when you didn't have industrialization. It's all about perspective. Another great example is Hong Kong. 60 years ago, this place was a mere fishing village with virtually no natural resources. Today, it is one of the richest, most vibrant cities in the world. The skyline is stunning. Why is this the case? Because the British left them alone for the most part, and only protected property rights. It's one of the biggest centers for trade and commerce in the world, and it's because of capitalism. But i'm interested in your attribution of 22 000 children dying and 1 Billion in poverty to capitalism. My only question is: WHAT capitalism? There's no capitalism in Somalia. There's no capitalism in north Korea, in Liberia. " What did they do to deserve this?' nothing. Are you insinuating that I feel this is just? The problem of monopoly. "Keep in mind that this inequality is even though there are quite a bit of regulations on businesses and monopolies in every country, in a total free market, the situation would be far FAR worse." Incorrect. In a free market, there is no barriers to entry to any given field. There would be more competition, and therefore a true monopoly would be less likely. But I suppose this also depends on what you mean by monopoly. There is a coercive monopoly, and a voluntary monopoly. An example of a non coercive monopoly would be if say phone company x owns a bigger share of the market than phone company y. As long as there is no force involved, this is fine. All that means is that people are choosing company x over company y. That doesn't mean that phone company abc can't come in with a better business model and therefore gain more of the market than company x. As long as there are no guns in anybody's face, I see no issue, moral or economic. However, an example of a coercive monopoly is the government itself. You don't have a choice to pay taxes, whether you voted or not. Participation is forced. The government is the only entity that can truly claim a monopoly on the provision of certain goods and services be they roads, police/law courts, healthcare in my country etc. Government is the biggest, most destructive monopoly in all of human history. So to use it to fight against monopoly is to use amputation to cure a hangnail. "Let us now examine the effects of a Monopoly by referring back to the McDonald's example. McDonald's out-competes other fast food chains and starts expanding into other food products or allying with other companies (like they did with Coca-cola). Soon enough, the anarcho capitalist world must rely on McDonald's for all food and Coke for all drinks." I swear i'm not being asinine when I ask this, but does that not sound even slightly ridiculous to you? First of all, it's the government that subsidizes much of the food industry, causing problems. Secondly, you say that in an ancap society competition would be eliminated because presumably smaller companies wouldn't be able to compete etc etc. But one of the core issues here is that, in a free society nobody can force you to buy McDonalds or Coke if you don't want to. You can buy from whole foods, you can grow your own food which my aunt mostly does, you can go to the grocery store, you could go to other restaurants. There is no little spooky voice in your head compelling you to buy Mcdonalds. And if there is a spooky voice in your head telling you to buy mcdonalds, I recommend you talk to a therapist. The way companies make money is buy producing a good or a service, and then trading said good or service with people for money. The only way a company can trade with people is if people are willing to trade with them. Again, as long as it's a voluntary transaction then I see no problem. If people really don't want to buy from mcdonalds then they wont. Some competitors will arise, or they'll find another means. Now to your third point about the problem of monopoly, you are in part correct. People don't go into business to serve others. Steve Jobs didn't create the iPhone because he cared about you and me. He created the iPhone to make money, and to create something beautiful and put it out into the world. People go into business to improve their life, to pursue happiness. Now we can talk about the environment in the next round if you want, I feel that it's a bigger issue than I could really do justice in this round. And about the second point you made with regards to this issue of underpaying their employees. Nobody forces the employees to work anywhere. If Target offers a higher wage than Walmart, the employee is completely free to work there instead. And if there are no other job opportunities, then he/she should be grateful to have a job period. An alternative to Anarcho-Capitalism. Now here you talk about how that under democratic socialism there would be no poverty, because all people would be housed, clothed, fed, given their own personal unicorn, cotton candy clouds and whatnot. ( Okay, I was being asinine that time, but I just had to, I apologize.) Socialism is Socialism, democratic or otherwise. The soviet union was socialist. All citizens were equal. Well, all equally poor and miserable. They had equal opportunity... to go straight to the gulag. And don't tell me this isn't " real socialism." Socialism is defined as "any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods." In the USSR, the government controlled the entire means of production, the food supply, employment and everything else. As a result, millions are now dead. The idea that if we just had the smartest, best, most educated people elected to power we'd live in paradise is 100% wrong. Nobody, no matter how smart knows enough to run an economy. Humans are complicated creatures, with various different wants and needs. The notion that a few select people can figure all of this out is what caused mass starvation in the Ukraine under the Soviet Union. Now, I know that immediately you are going to Point to various country's like Sweden, Norway, Denmark and various others. These countries are relatively socialist, and have rather large welfare states. But one of the most important thing to understand is that these are some of the most economically free countries in the world. For example, Denmark is number eleventh, actually above the united states which is twelfth. That is in spite of their terrible tax system, which is something like 68%. They have much less regulations and restrictions. Lets take another example, this time Sweden. Sweden used to be one of the largest, best, most thriving and free economies in the world. Then in the 60s, they started to develop this massive welfare state. And for a while, they were alright, because they had lots of wealth left over from the time before the socialists. But in the 90s, they were in trouble. They actually started CUTTING their welfare state. I think that a lot of what this boils down to is what our view of rights are. In my view, a right is a right to action, not to receive something. If you say that someone has the right TO healthcare, then someone must be forced to provide it, the same goes for education, food, housing, clothing, retirement and work. I think that you have the right to pursue all of those things, as they are all important and essential to human life. But it's the right to PURSUE those things, not the right to receive them. I can trade my labor for money, or people can voluntarily decide to give me money out of charity, but I can't force them to give me their money. To sum up, I am against the state because I think that it is both an immoral and impractical institution. http://www.libsdebunked.com... http://www.heritage.org... http://mises.org...