Imagine you could pass any law or regulation in a capitalist society in order to make it more socialist.

[Bijou Drains]

moderator3 wrote:

Obviously some users fail to grasp the reason the rules encourage us to contact the moderators regarding moderation decisions.The idea behind contacting the moderators off thread, regarding moderation decisions, is to allow a dsicussion to take place between moderator and forum user, that doesn't clog up the thread.   

Actually, let's be honest, the rules don't "encourage" us to contact moderators re moderation decisions, they forbid us from certain actions with regards to Moderation decisions.With regards to clogging up threads, it has been suggested on several occasions, that I am aware of, that a moderation discussion thread be started Such a thread would allow free discussion of moderation decisions, and stop the clogging up of threads. This suggestion has been turned down by Mods in the past, but to me would seem to be an easy way to resolve a very tricky problem.

[moderator3]

I tried.Reminder: Rule 1. The general topic of each forum is given by the posted forum description. Do not start a thread in a forum unless it matches the given topic, and do not derail existing threads with off-topic posts. May I remind users that there already exists a thread in the Web/Tech section of this forum, where suggestions regarding moderation can be discussed.http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/website-technical/moderation-suggestions?page=14

[moderator1]

Tim Kilgallon wrote:

moderator3 wrote:

Obviously some users fail to grasp the reason the rules encourage us to contact the moderators regarding moderation decisions.The idea behind contacting the moderators off thread, regarding moderation decisions, is to allow a dsicussion to take place between moderator and forum user, that doesn't clog up the thread.   

Actually, let's be honest, the rules don't "encourage" us to contact moderators re moderation decisions, they forbid us from certain actions with regards to Moderation decisions.With regards to clogging up threads, it has been suggested on several occasions, that I am aware of, that a moderation discussion thread be started Such a thread would allow free discussion of moderation decisions, and stop the clogging up of threads. This suggestion has been turned down by Mods in the past, but to me would seem to be an easy way to resolve a very tricky problem.

Has everybody forgoten that a thread already exists for the discussion of moderation matters?  It's called 'Moderation suggestions' http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/website-technical/moderation-suggestions which was specifically set up to discuss the very issues now under consideration in the open and transparent to all users..The PM function is there for good reason:It allows users to conduct a private conversation away from the forum.  Much like a telephone conversation.It allows the main forum to be focused on conversations relating to socialism rather than clogging up the main forum with discussion on the: deliberations of the moderators; complaints; private suggestions on moderation; and subjects which are irrevelant to the main forum.In essence, on the forum, there are available two separate methods for having a conversation on any subject: Public via the link above and private via the PM function.  

[Anonymous]

lindanesocialist wrote:

mcolome1 wrote:

I have decided not to partcipate in this forum anymore. I am hanging my boxing gloves. I will go to the places where they are discussing about the real problems of the working class. The socialist party has lost its working class basis. This is like a social club.  Left wingers are doing a better job than this forum

Please don't do that comrade. Your contributions are intelligent and informed and,  more importantly, democracy, socialism the working class  and your opposition to dictatoral attitudes permeates your posts which is badly needed to counter the rubbish we have to read at times

Agreed!@Mcolme1, I don't want you to leave.  Just ignore my posts if they bother you.  Don't let one thread and one poster ruin all your great relationships with the other posters. Regardless of your feelings towards me being negative, I value your time and have profited from our free association. 

[Anonymous]

Removed to off-topic 

[moderator2]

Steve-san-francisco's latest message on this thread has been deleted and removed to off-topic. 

[alanjjohnstone]

To return to the topic theme, this may be a useful related videohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs&app=desktop

[Subhaditya]

Wow my hopelessness went up further after watching that video.

[Anonymous]

alanjjohnstone wrote:

To return to the topic theme, this may be a useful related videohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs&app=desktop

It's a great video. I'm a fan of CGP Grey for the great videos on electioin systems and voting.   My Thinking is that while the video was an excellent explanation for the emergent properties of a system of leaders and rules using capital based money, the argument falls apart if you have a time value based currency instead.  for example: in a time value based currency system you can't get oil or gold or diamond profit based dictators in the same way.  You might be able to do something similar and there's an argument about if time chits wouild lead to democracy or communism, that's worth having.  But at the very minimum, having a time value currency would be an opportunity to recreate the rules and laws regarding exchanges of value, aka the keys of power.  Is it possible to construct a digital currency that replaces the dollar?  Say for the sake of argument that a value exchange currency to replace the dollar is going to be created and will replace the dollar because that's the path capitalist economiies are following.  This allows who ever controlls the usage of the time value currency the ability to set rules on how the currency is used.  In capital based currency we have some rules about refunds and exchanges, and some rules about what can be sold (most things) and what can't be sold (slaves, some sex services in some locatioins, you can't buy love or marriage, etc.). If we own the time value based curency we could write our own rules for use of the currency.  We might make rules for use of our currency like "surplus profit has to go to the public not a business", or "every purchase and use of the currency MUST be public and searchable so that no one can make secret deals using our currency" or we might make rules such as there's a maximum rate of exchange converting personal hours worked into capital based dollars.  The big difference I see between capital based dollar exchanges and a hypothetical time value exchance sytem we create is that capitalism requires much less information handling.  In capitalism exchange all you need is to know to makea  deal is the the price and who much it's worth you you.  That's not enough information to make an exchange so people use non-market information like the company reputation or your credit score might be considered for you ability to make an exchange in a capital market.  But in this capitalist exchange the details of what factors you consider and the information you gathered outside the price and product sales reciept is not part of the exchange agreement explicitly.  So with a post comunist revolution society using a value based dollars you would want to include more information about the exchange limitations and make them included as part of the exchange agreement.  In a post comunist economic revolution society, you would want tyour economic exchanges to be written by the individual people and when you give someone you time chit or money, it can include limitations, like "not for use towards any purchase of weapons", or "this money I exchange with you will decrease in value and return to me gradually over 1 year if you don't use it.  In communist exchange system we would need a formalized way of writing all these rules about how the value or exchanged product can be used and we need to public receipts and crowdsourced enforcement of exchange agreements.  as I said at the beginning of this paragraph, the big difference between capital based money and time value based money is that we have a better chance to own the means of exchange now, with information processing technology for making agreements. So computers and information technology for facilitiating exchanges of a more complex nature is a technology determined requirement for communism to operate successfully. CGP Grey, has a few slides in his presentation that just assume the government or a dicator or someone in power has the ability to collect taxes.  That seems a well supported argument as long at the currency you're using to collect taxes is capital based.  If the unit of currency for collecting taxes is hourly based, then some important things change. If the rules for exchanges prohibit taxation in one way or another, then the power collection by the dictator or leader are similarly limited.  So you might argue the political leader can just rewrite the rules for exchangs and take the power from the people who own the digital currency.  But technologically, that's not possible.  The blockchain currency exchange rules can not be changed using conventional means and we can program the currency at creation time to not allow changes of certain kinds later.  We can add rules into the currency on how it's allowed to be used that work at a digital level and would require complete shutdown or caputre of over 50% of the world wide internet users to circumvent (for example, there's lots of other ways to protect power of currency ownership in a fully mature time value exchange economy.   So in consideration of time value exchange currency systems, it's worthwile to consider what laws should be made for our new currency. We also want to consider how we can gain a position of power early in the currency development and evolution of rules and use that position to create more rules that make it ever harder and harder to use our currency in the bad ways used by the capitalist dollar currency rules and laws.  For example we wouild start by outlawying fractionalal reserve banking so we don't have contend with bankers competing for power with us.  or for military dictatorships in the example, it's harder to lie to the people if it's public knowledge where the money comes from and goes and that information is encoded indestructibly on the blockchain on the world wide web.  So our 100% public exchanges with all terms of the agreement listed on the reciept part of our rules for using our new currency could thwart several dictatorships before they start. 

[robbo203]

Steve What you need understand is that socialism is the proposition that the productive resources of the world should be made the common property of everyone in the world.  Production today is a completely socialised process. There is literally nothing that is produced today that does not involve directly, but mainly indirectly, the entire world's workforce.  Socialism amounts to bringing the nature of property relationships into line with the character of modern production. Hence the very word "socialism" itself.  It denotes not just social or common ownership of the means of production; it is also a reference to the the character of the production process itself This is important because, historically speaking, the rationale for capitalism promoted by its early ideologues like Locke was based on what was called a "labour theory of property".  Namely if you expended your own labour on something that product by right becomes your property.  However, this is looking at the isolated – and essentially mythic – worker creating things on her own and asserting her right of ownership over those things by virtue of the labour she expended on it,  Even if this idea had any merit in the past, it is absolutely no longer relevant  today.  Everything you touch and see and use as a product of human labour today contains within itself the congealed labour of millions upon millions of workers – like the workers who  mined the ore that was transformed into finished products like the turbines that drive the power stations manned by other workers that provide you with the electricity that powers the computer your are typing on and so on and so forth. So socialism entails common ownership of the worlds productive resources but what does this in turn entail? Above all it entails the demise of any kind of exchange economy To develop this point- we would not, for instance, think it sensible to talk of you having to buy a loaf of bread from the bakery you own.  It is because you own it that you can dispense with the formality of buying that loaf baked within its four walls.  The same logic would apply if a group of people owned that bakery or, indeed, if the whole of society owned it.   Actually, ownership by the whole of society of, not just the bakery, but all the means of the means of producing and distributing wealth – what is called a system of “common ownership” or communism/socialism – would in fact logically spell the complete disappearance of the market, of all buying and selling transactions, altogether.  This what the famous Communist Manifesto of 1848 was getting at when it talked of the “communistic abolition of buying and selling”.  Common ownership is what would make this possible It is frankly depressing to hear you talk of  the need for a "unit of currency for collecting taxes that is hourly based"  or of "outlawing fractional reserve banking so we don't have contend with bankers competing for power with us".  You seem to be completely trapped within the loop of reformist thinking that pertains to  an exchange based economy and, hence, a system of private property in the means of production.  It is little wonder that you are not having much traction here You need to raise your sights higher and begin to see the wood for trees

[Anonymous]

robbo203 wrote:

Steve What you need understand is that socialism is the proposition that the productive resources of the world should be made the common property of everyone in the world.  Production today is a completely socialised process. There is literally nothing that is produced today that does not involve directly, but mainly indirectly, the entire world's workforce.  Socialism amounts to bringing the nature of property relationships into line with the character of modern production. Hence the very word "socialism" itself.  It denotes not just social or common ownership of the means of production; it is also a reference to the the character of the production process itself

I understood that already.  I'm practicing it with my production of postcards.  Can't you recognize this behavior as socialism in practice?

robbo203 wrote:

This is important because, historically speaking, the rationale for capitalism promoted by its early ideologues like Locke was based on what was called a "labour theory of property".  Namely if you expended your own labour on something that product by right becomes your property.  However, this is looking at the isolated – and essentially mythic – worker creating things on her own and asserting her right of ownership over those things by virtue of the labour she expended on it,  Even if this idea had any merit in the past, it is absolutely no longer relevant  today.  Everything you touch and see and use as a product of human labour today contains within itself the congealed labour of millions upon millions of workers – like the workers who  mined the ore that was transformed into finished products like the turbines that drive the power stations manned by other workers that provide you with the electricity that powers the computer your are typing on and so on and so forth.

I agree with the part where you say "even if this idea had any merit in the past, it is absolutely no longer relevant today".  the question I explored in my postcard series was to discover how people wouild congreel their labour.  What is the structure of the congeeling and what laws or currency or technology would affect the way labor congeeled.  Think deeper and you'll see I'm showing by example and practice how this would work out and creatiing a comunisim simulation in the form of postcard conversations of free association where socialist principles were practiced and explained and demonstrated. 

robbo203 wrote:

So socialism entails common ownership of the worlds productive resources but what does this in turn entail? Above all it entails the demise of any kind of exchange economy

NO NO NO.  You foolish person.  who told you that nonsense and why do you believe it?  What exactly do you mean by "exchange" because I exchange air just by breathing?  And I exchange time with friends and with advertisers on TV and with you guys here on the forum.  So everytime two people get together, they are exchanging time with each other.  So when you say there will be no exchanges, it sounds like you're saying people won't talk to each ohter and won't exchange favors or gifts.  Is that what you're intending, or can you clarify what you mean by the quote? and if people are exchanging things they can cary or things they can say or time, then what do you call that instead of using the word "economy"?  Can I just replace the word "economy" with "Socialism" in my statements and make that work if you think an economy is the opposite of a socialism?  You're making up non-sequiters and passting them off as QED

robbo203 wrote:

 To develop this point- we would not, for instance, think it sensible to talk of you having to buy a loaf of bread from the bakery you own.  It is because you own it that you can dispense with the formality of buying that loaf baked within its four walls.  The same logic would apply if a group of people owned that bakery or, indeed, if the whole of society owned it.   Actually, ownership by the whole of society of, not just the bakery, but all the means of the means of producing and distributing wealth – what is called a system of “common ownership” or communism/socialism – would in fact logically spell the complete disappearance of the market, of all buying and selling transactions, altogether.  This what the famous Communist Manifesto of 1848 was getting at when it talked of the “communistic abolition of buying and selling”.  Common ownership is what would make this possible

I understand that, but lets go further with this reasoning.  What does this "common ownership" look like and how does it work and who controls access to what specefically throught what method.  surely in communisim is is possible for two people to reach for the same glass of water brought to the table by the waiter and they would need to decide who gets the glass of water.  How does comunism organize the flow of materials and time in it's society and what do you call that organizatioin of internal time and resorurce flows and how does it function specefically in an example?  How does comunism resolve disputes between interest blocks like "tree lovers" vs "technology fans" when the production is limited or the availability of peoples time is scarce.  Can you just rewrite one of my paragraphs or translate it into communism speak for me if that's you're language of choice.   

robbo203 wrote:

 It is frankly depressing to hear you talk of  the need for a "unit of currency for collecting taxes that is hourly based"  or of "outlawing fractional reserve banking so we don't have contend with bankers competing for power with us".  You seem to be completely trapped within the loop of reformist thinking that pertains to  an exchange based economy and, hence, a system of private property in the means of production.  It is little wonder that you are not having much traction here

robbo203 wrote:

 You need to raise your sights higher and begin to see the wood for trees

I knew all that already. But thanks for reminding me of the terminology and jargon. It's been a while since my college philosophy and economics classes.  You seem to have mistaken me for an intellectual lightweight.  Look up and see the higher purpose in my words and ideas. Think outside of the box by reframing your vocabulary.  Just rewrite any sentence you feel is objectionably communistic for me and write it in a way you believe a socialist wouild write it.  So do the editing and fix a peragraph you keep complaining in theory about.  Communism is knocking on your door with a postcard telling you how to start the revolution.   

[robbo203]

Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:

 NO NO NO.  You foolish person.  who told you that nonsense and why do you believe it?  What exactly do you mean by "exchange" because I exchange air just by breathing?  And I exchange time with friends and with advertisers on TV and with you guys here on the forum.  So everytime two people get together, they are exchanging time with each other.  So when you say there will be no exchanges, it sounds like you're saying people won't talk to each ohter and won't exchange favors or gifts.  Is that what you're intending, or can you clarify what you mean by the quote? and if people are exchanging things they can cary or things they can say or time, then what do you call that instead of using the word "economy"?  Can I just replace the word "economy" with "Socialism" in my statements and make that work if you think an economy is the opposite of a socialism?  You're making up non-sequiters and passting them off as QED 

 Sigh.  You evidently dont understand what I'm driving at, Steve, or you are not familiar with the jargon or whatever.  When I say common ownership logically entails the demise of any kind of exchange economy, I am NOT talking about "exchange" in the trite sense that you allude to.- exchanging ideas,  breathing etc . I would have thought that was pretty obvious and I didnt need to spell it out. Its just a silly objection you are raising here. I am talking about an  exchange economy.  Do you understand what is meant by this?  It means goods and services in general are exchanged on a quid pro quo basis.  They are bought and sold because the  means of production are privately owned .  Common ownership thus logically precludes economic exchange whether this takes the form of money-based exchange  or barter.  You have been going  on about the need for a "unit of currency for collecting taxes that is hourly based" .  But "taxes" and "currency" are forms of exchange-based phenomena – meaning all you are really putting forward here is an alternative arrangement for administering a system of private property relationships. Thats not what socialism is about….

[Anonymous]

robbo203 wrote:

Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:

 NO NO NO.  You foolish person.  who told you that nonsense and why do you believe it?  What exactly do you mean by "exchange" because I exchange air just by breathing?  And I exchange time with friends and with advertisers on TV and with you guys here on the forum.  So everytime two people get together, they are exchanging time with each other.  So when you say there will be no exchanges, it sounds like you're saying people won't talk to each ohter and won't exchange favors or gifts.  Is that what you're intending, or can you clarify what you mean by the quote? and if people are exchanging things they can cary or things they can say or time, then what do you call that instead of using the word "economy"?  Can I just replace the word "economy" with "Socialism" in my statements and make that work if you think an economy is the opposite of a socialism?  You're making up non-sequiters and passting them off as QED 

 Sigh.  You evidently dont understand what I'm driving at, Steve, or you are not familiar with the jargon or whatever.  When I say common ownership logically entails the demise of any kind of exchange economy, I am NOT talking about "exchange" in the trite sense that you allude to.- exchanging ideas,  breathing etc . I would have thought that was pretty obvious and I didnt need to spell it out. Its just a silly objection you are raising here. I am talking about an  exchange economy.  Do you understand what is meant by this?  It means goods and services in general are exchanged on a quid pro quo basis.  They are bought and sold because the  means of production are privately owned .  Common ownership thus logically precludes economic exchange whether this takes the form of money-based exchange  or barter.  You have been going  on about the need for a "unit of currency for collecting taxes that is hourly based" .  But "taxes" and "currency" are forms of exchange-based phenomena – meaning all you are really putting forward here is an alternative arrangement for administering a system of private property relationships. Thats not what socialism is about….

 Sigh, You evidently still haven't learned to think critically about what Marx leaves out.  What "Exchange" means in the context of this conversation or economics is not what you pre-concieve and I do not believe Marx limited his critques to to exchanges in a capitalist market.  People exchange time all the time usually without any involvement of the capitalist markets or money.  It's not trite or unimportant, and it's the every day worker persons exchanges of time that are the most valuable and important to consider in politics and society. People still need to exchange time.  and a unit of currency based on time would help that.  What do you call a rule based exchange of time between two freely associating persons?  One person makes an offer to exchange an days labor on planting the fields and includes exclusions on the exchange of time offer "not valid for capitalist, or people outside our county. Exchange offer void if the tractor breaks. or there's a crop failure. local food for local communist only". Exchanges can have rules and conditions and usage rights, although in a cash based capitalist economy these exchange condition rules are usually only discussed by lawers for high value items because previous to the world wide web it was infeasible to enforce complex exchange limitations and verify time exchanged is used as agreed.  Cash for capital goods is a very limited type of exchange system that doesn't support complex agreements or exchange conditions written by the consumer. Cash for goods exchanges work well for a pre-technology society that couldn't process the information from thousands of competing agreements.  Cash for goods is simple and works with anyone, even poeple you would not want to trade with and you'll never know who they are. Without computers and global verification of exchanges for meeting terms and conditions that can handle billions of individuals with their own unique terms and conditions for any free association agreement, communism is not possible.  I'm creating a system that allows comunism to flourish by supporting terms and limitations on exchange agreements that put the power to set rules on usage of time in the control of the people who's time is ultimately used. I don't think money based on capital goods is the heart of the problem. I think the heart of the problem is with the one sided disempowerment of individuals to commonly and conveniently set rules for the exchange of their time. Companies and businss can pass a law prohibiting copying of their video and it's enfored by the government.  Individuals in our capitalist economy to not have the ability to pass a law on how the products of their labor are used.  BUT by creating a secondary exchange economy using hours, there's no existing legal and burocratic rules on what can be exchange and how the exchanges can be written or the terms of the excange agreement.  With our hourly unit of time currency, we have the ability to set our own individual rules for exchanges so that the playing field is tilted in favor of individual power to set market exchange rules and practices. You're close to say that I'm suggesting "all you are really putting forward here is an alternative arrangement for administering a system of private property relationships". But that's really only close because it's a straw man argument that ignores what I'm suggesting and isn't a very intelligent or sincere response (I'm assuming you're just so arrogant that you think you already know everything and just need to a wake up call to see things differently).  I am suggesting and building a prototype of an alternative exchange system and a change to how goods and services are exchange.  Marx suggested an alternative exchange system too.  (by "exchange" i mean any trade or giving or voluntary sharing of time in which you will act as someone elses servant using whatever means and abilities you own.   When you're trading time, ownership of the property doesn't come into the question.  Property is not necessarily owned in a time value exchange system just like time is not necessarily owned in a capital goods exchange system.   it's not required for a time exchange economy to have private property, but it's not excluded either.  A time value exchange economy is ambivelent about the need for a property ownership. All that's required to make an exchange in a time value currency is that you have time you can offer or time you need ffrom somoene and that you or they have the means of working as agreed for that time.  It's vaguley related to the means of production since you can't trade an hours time running a corn planting tractor assembly without the ability to come up with a corn planint tractor assembly to spend your hour as promised.  But if nothing is owned and their's no private property then nothing much changes for a time valued market exchange. The time value market exchange system could keep functioning in a world without private property, but it can also function in a world with private poperty.  I think it would probably work better in a society without property, but that's one of the questions I'm here to research answers to.  

[robbo203]

Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:

.  I am suggesting and building a prototype of an alternative exchange system and a change to how goods and services are exchange.  Marx suggested an alternative exchange system too.  (by "exchange" i mean any trade or giving or voluntary sharing of time in which you will act as someone elses servant using whatever means and abilities you own.   When you're trading time, ownership of the property doesn't come into the question.  Property is not necessarily owned in a time value exchange system just like time is not necessarily owned in a capital goods exchange system.   it's not required for a time exchange economy to have private property, but it's not excluded either.  A time value exchange economy is ambivalent about the need for a property ownership. All that's required to make an exchange in a time value currency is that you have time you can offer or time you need from someone and that you or they have the means of working as agreed for that time.  It's vaguely related to the means of production since you can't trade an hours time running a corn planting tractor assembly without the ability to come up with a corn planint tractor assembly to spend your hour as promised.  But if nothing is owned and their's no private property then nothing much changes for a time valued market exchange. The time value market exchange system could keep functioning in a world without private property, but it can also function in a world with private property.  I think it would probably work better in a society without property, but that's one of the questions I'm here to research answers to.  

 Its a pity you did not heed my key point about what constitutes an "exchange economy".  Had you done so we could have all been spared this long rambling – not to say haughty –  lecture of yours which only succeeds in evading the point and in you tying yourself up in knots.  Once again, and for your benefit, what makes an exchange economy an exchange economy is the quid pro quality of the relationships that define it.  In other words, I give you something ONLY ON CONDITION that you give me back something in return.  Necessarily, this implies an exchange in ownership  titles to the things being exchange.  In other words it implies private property. I am NOT talking about "exchange" in the looser sense such as  when people "exchange" ideas over the internet. I am talking about a very specific narrow meaning of the term as applied to the field of economics.  You don't seem to understand this..  In the looser meaning of the term we can indeed talk about there a kind of exchange or reciprocity in a socialist or communist society.  The anthropologist term "generalised reciprocity" neatly sums up for me what a socialist society is all about. You freely invoke Marx but nowhere do you cite any source which makes me wonder how familiar you are with the subject anyway.  Allow me to quote from the Critique of the Gotha Programme where Marx says this: Within the co-operative society based on common ownership of the means of production, the producers do not exchange their products; just as little does the labor employed on the products appear here as the value of these products, as a material quality possessed by them, since now, in contrast to capitalist society, individual labor no longer exists in an indirect fashion but directly as a component part of total labor. The phrase "proceeds of labor", objectionable also today on account of its ambiguity, thus loses all meaning. Did you get that Steve? The producers do not exchange their products And so we come to your fanciful idea of a "time value market exchange system" which you try to reassure us " could keep functioning in a world without private property, but it can also function in a world with private property".  Really? So in this " time value market exchange system" if I offer to expend a certain amount of time doing something for you and you decline to reciprocate that means no "market exchange" will then take place – yes?  If not why call its a market exchange at all.  How can you separate the exchange of labour time from the aforementioned "exchange of products" which that this labour time served to create? Note the thoroughly bourgeois content of your whole argument.  Exchange  of time is perceived as a matter of purely self interested concern and confined to dyadic one-to-one exchanges between individuals..  There is no conception of the wider community in your vision which seems to have its roots ina mythical  petty commodity producing society To that end you debase the very meaning of words like market and exchange economy and reduce them to meaningless drivel .  You remind of the economists who glibly talk of the "natural capital" that Mother nature provides thereby universalising pr "naturalising" and  rendering timeless, the capitalist mode of production. If your "time value market exchange system" does not signify private property then why on earth give it such a ridiculous name? Socially necessary labour time is of course how value is constituted in capitalism.  It seems to me this is what you fanciful scheme boils down to – just another version of the same society in which time is bought and sold

[Anonymous]

robbo203 wrote:

Steve-SanFrancisco-UserExperienceResearchSpecialist wrote:

.  I am suggesting and building a prototype of an alternative exchange system and a change to how goods and services are exchange.  Marx suggested an alternative exchange system too.  (by "exchange" i mean any trade or giving or voluntary sharing of time in which you will act as someone elses servant using whatever means and abilities you own.   When you're trading time, ownership of the property doesn't come into the question.  Property is not necessarily owned in a time value exchange system just like time is not necessarily owned in a capital goods exchange system.   it's not required for a time exchange economy to have private property, but it's not excluded either.  A time value exchange economy is ambivalent about the need for a property ownership. All that's required to make an exchange in a time value currency is that you have time you can offer or time you need from someone and that you or they have the means of working as agreed for that time.  It's vaguely related to the means of production since you can't trade an hours time running a corn planting tractor assembly without the ability to come up with a corn planint tractor assembly to spend your hour as promised.  But if nothing is owned and their's no private property then nothing much changes for a time valued market exchange. The time value market exchange system could keep functioning in a world without private property, but it can also function in a world with private property.  I think it would probably work better in a society without property, but that's one of the questions I'm here to research answers to.  

 Its a pity you did not heed my key point about what constitutes an "exchange economy".  Had you done so we could have all been spared this long rambling – not to say haughty –  lecture of yours which only succeeds in evading the point and in you tying yourself up in knots.  Once again, and for your benefit, what makes an exchange economy an exchange economy is the quid pro quality of the relationships that define it.  In other words, I give you something ONLY ON CONDITION that you give me back something in return.  Necessarily, this implies an exchange in ownership  titles to the things being exchange.  In other words it implies private property. I am NOT talking about "exchange" in the looser sense such as  when people "exchange" ideas over the internet. I am talking about a very specific narrow meaning of the term as applied to the field of economics.  You don't seem to understand this..  In the looser meaning of the term we can indeed talk about there a kind of exchange or reciprocity in a socialist or communist society.  The anthropologist term "generalised reciprocity" neatly sums up for me what a socialist society is all about. You freely invoke Marx but nowhere do you cite any source which makes me wonder how familiar you are with the subject anyway.  Allow me to quote from the Critique of the Gotha Programme where Marx says this: Within the co-operative society based on common ownership of the means of production, the producers do not exchange their products; just as little does the labor employed on the products appear here as the value of these products, as a material quality possessed by them, since now, in contrast to capitalist society, individual labor no longer exists in an indirect fashion but directly as a component part of total labor. The phrase "proceeds of labor", objectionable also today on account of its ambiguity, thus loses all meaning. Did you get that Steve? The producers do not exchange their products And so we come to your fanciful idea of a "time value market exchange system" which you try to reassure us " could keep functioning in a world without private property, but it can also function in a world with private property".  Really? So in this " time value market exchange system" if I offer to expend a certain amount of time doing something for you and you decline to reciprocate that means no "market exchange" will then take place – yes?  If not why call its a market exchange at all.  How can you separate the exchange of labour time from the aforementioned "exchange of products" which that this labour time served to create? Note the thoroughly bourgeois content of your whole argument.  Exchange  of time is perceived as a matter of purely self interested concern and confined to dyadic one-to-one exchanges between individuals..  There is no conception of the wider community in your vision which seems to have its roots ina mythical  petty commodity producing society To that end you debase the very meaning of words like market and exchange economy and reduce them to meaningless drivel .  You remind of the economists who glibly talk of the "natural capital" that Mother nature provides thereby universalising pr "naturalising" and  rendering timeless, the capitalist mode of production. If your "time value market exchange system" does not signify private property then why on earth give it such a ridiculous name? Socially necessary labour time is of course how value is constituted in capitalism.  It seems to me this is what you fanciful scheme boils down to – just another version of the same society in which time is bought and sold

Sorry I was dismissive. I felt slighted by your dismissal "sigh" statement.  I understand what you wrote and I value your insight.  I agree that all that you’re saying has merit worthy of my reading.  FYI, I long ago forgot more Marx than 95% of americans will ever know, but I'm certainly not a Marx scholar.  Anyway, I think I'm advancing his reasoning and principles, and not intending to capture his iconic status and prestigious name with my ideas.  I bring him up mostly to try to speak your language, not because I’m an expert on him. Thanks sincerely, for the thoughtful reply and I commend you on thinking critically in spite of my dismissive tone.  You raise a lot of questions, which I appreciate and some of them I've dealt with in my postcard series already so can past them in here for you to consider. Some of your arguments I think are falling into a capitalist thinking trap.  Let me explain to you how I see the difference between time value exchanges and Capital value exchanges.   In a nutshell my argument is that time is not the same as money.  They work differently in how they are produced and exchanged.  The different way they affect society has implications for communism or socialism or marxism or whatever term I should be using as the closest comparison to this concept, which I think you called Taylorism.  Again, it's not taylorism, because we've expanded the power of the individual to set rules for their use of their productive "capital" (converse of marx philosophy about productive "labor"?).  By "capital" here I mean that literally in a time value exchange economy you are your time and abilities and you don't have the ability serve 1 hour to plow a field if you don't have access to a tractor. but how you get access to that tractor is up to the individual, just like how you get access to time is up to the individual in a capitalist property market.  .But before addressing each of your great points one at a time. I want you to consider this statement below for 5 minutes time.  Then if you could write down your remaining objections or questions, I'll spend 5 minutes of my time responding to each of them (up to 5 questions max please).  .If you agree with the premise that a time value economy is functionally equivalent to a capital value economy for all purposes of technological determinism of the political state of the world, then . . . Requirements for exchange in a capitalist property object value society.Capital value is exchange starts with an advertisement which is a type of exchange offer specifying limiting the information that will appear on the bill of sale specified to be consideration of dollars and product name or product details or product number.  Receipts and Bills of sales and customer satisfaction information is owned by private individuals and organizations, but mostly by organizations.  Lots of laws and rules about what you can do with capital. Few rules on what you can do with your time. Rules emerge to maximize profit.Rules are written by and for people with the most money. People without money are marginalized or leave the economy. Those who spend their time productively busy and the idle rent collectors are indistinguishable by examination their money and there’s no global exchange record for the public to examine and learn more about how they spend their time and their money expenditures are also hard to discover.Money makes money and naturally leads to concentration of wealth and steep inequality. The system of patronage is established and entrenched with rules created to consolidate and hold power. there's limited information exchanged in each property transaction on the receipt and very limited protection against property misuse and no protection against time misuse. Requirements for exchange in a comunist time service value society.Time value exchange starts with an advertisement which is a type of exchange offer specifying limited information about cost in minutes and product name or product details or product number.  Receipts and Bills of sales and customer satisfaction information is PUBLIC and built into the digital exchange currency for verification.  Individuals can make up and write down any exchange agreement they imagine as long as they specify the service they are asking for and how many minutes of that service and access to any means or abilities required for the service. Public commentaries and reviews are instant and global and verified for each transaction on your public record and all time value exchange transactions are public record.  Receipts and Bills of sales and customer satisfaction information is NOT owned by anyone and can not be censored or limited to any  individual and organization if relevant to the exchange being considered.Lots of laws and rules about how and what you can and will do with your time.  Few rules on what can and can’t do with capital. Rules emerge to maximize time.Rules are written by and for people with the most time. People without time are marginalized or leave the economy.  The propertied and destitute produce 24 hours a day each but their abilities offered in an exchange may differ based on access to means of production. All Exchanges are public and documented in google docs with graphs and examination not only possible, but there are contest with time awards to improve the reporting format and features.  The technology for managing time is automatic and evolving continuously better.  How people exchange their time in the market exchange system is on record with a place for satisfaction or dissatisfaction comments from the purchaser.Time Makes Time only if that’s what the rules in the time value exchange economy encourage and promote. At present, whoever designs the time exchange system gets to make the rules, but I have decided to make all the rules up for public vote and furthermore focus on distributing rule making power down to the individual level. You can write an any time value exchange receipt and agreement stipulation like, "this exchange offer is not valid if you're a republican" or "I only trade my personal time equally for another person's time at 1:1 exchange rate for this exchange offer." or "This offer to trade my time for yours at 2:1 exchange rate is only valid for someone who has access to the means for planting a field with a combine tractor". There's strong protection against misuse of time, but limited protection against misuse of property.Conclusion:it would be a good idea for communist to get their voice heard early in decision making on the rules for the digital currency used to exchange time.  Some rules can be coded and locked into the currency at creation time technologically and invulnerable to corruption.  while other rules can be programed to allow instant voting via any voting method the first person to suggests feels is best.  So Think of building a time value exchange system as a free “do over” for the market place.  Imagine if you could go back in time and make a few rules about the capital market economy early in it’s evolution to make sure it follows the right path.  I have that chance right now by building a time value exchange system. Imagine if you decide when you program the digital currency that all disputes about payment should be handled by a randomly selected survey of the community with their time paid for in a way you specify. Imagine if you could program into the currency that all voting on rules must use an instant runoff ballot. These things are possible today and I'm working on doing them. What do you think about that? any suggestions? – Secondary Conclusion:So by running a time value exchange economy, it can be somewhat separated functionally from interference with the capitalist economy.  Now either economy could try to pass rules for discriminating against the other economy such the time value economy ultimately has the superior strategic advantage in the struggle.  To understand that we first have to look at what would happen if practice if a small time value exchange community existed inside a capitalist society.  We know from practice this is possible today in the world.  They don’t last and self destruct or get taken over, but there’s nothing legally or economically in the rules of capitalism and capitalist society that prevent people from trying to be communist.  BUT in a time value exchange society the laws and rules can be written to preclude capitalist excess or perhaps the fundamentals of capitalism itself can be blanket excluded.  The contest between the time value and capital value exchange economies becomes a contest between two rule makers.  One rule makers makes rules for the capital economy and another rule maker makes rules for the Time Value Economy and they both compete for things in the world like votes or time or money or interest.  In a capitalist society money talks. In a time value economy time talks.  Here’s the big difference. People are the ones voting and can now choose which economy to vote in by spending their time in the time value exchange economy or spending their capital in their capital market exchange economy.  People who value time more than money will gradually participate more freely in the the time value exchange economy. People who value money more than time will gradually participate more freely in the capital market economy.  If people vote with their time in hours payment and people vote with their money in dollars and the people vote in an election at 1 person per vote, then the 1 person per vote probably swings the decision on any shared issue. So does the super-society that includes both economies leans the direction of majority of the people regarding a time vs money tradeoff decision type issue.     Related topic:Does that end the discussion on our ability to use Time Value Exchanges to promote comunism?  No. because time value exchanges can also be considered as a dual or second economy with all the abilities and functionality as our base capitalist economy.  So even though the capitalist government and economic system is still in existence, it doesn’t preclude a communist Time Value Exchange economy from operating within its rules.  There’s no law or economic principle in capitalist that prevents communist enclaves or clubs that exchange money and timeValueCurrency freely with each other following only the economic rules of capitalism.  If we imagine a world of exchanges between people in a communistic society and a capitalist society I think that the communist exchange types are a subset of the capitalist exchange types.  There are exchanges you can make in capitalist economies that you would not be able to make in a communist economy.  Most of them involving money and profiteering. So capitalism is more free than communism in the sense that it allows for more types of exchanges.  The Communism has a reduced set of exchanges allowed because to be communistic the exchange must meet certain requirements.     So let me explain how an exchange might work in a time value exchange economy.  I walk into a store I ask you “how many minutes of my time do you want in return for 30 seconds of your time and do you have to have the means to produce a key to unlock that glass case behind you and serve me by handing the that new cell phone.”  the salesman says, "I have the means to produce what you desire.  What is your community common hour to personal public service hour exchange rate?  The customer says "why are you asking me stupid questions.  I sent my exchange offer to you on your phone. just type how many of your personal public service minutes you want for the iphone and it will do the conversions into my personal minutes.  Hurry up now and read me the cost so I can agree or we can negotiate and I can get on with my busy life. The Salesman is rather sleazy now and I’m a hot looking woman so he asks “do you exchange personal private adult minutes?”  I look at him and say.  “No my exchange offers for private personal adult minutes are limited to just one person and it’s not you,  but, I have a PHD in economics and I could tell you how badly you're managing your inventory levels in 5 minutes and that ought to be worth the phone.  You need to post your prices in public service minutes on the front door if you want more business. I almost didn’t come in.  Check my Public Personnelle Profile for other satisfied customers who’ve exchange time with me for economics consultations.  Notice there’s Lots of 5 stars and payback thank you time.  My 5 minutes of Personal Public Economic consultation minutes trades at 500 times for community common minutes.  So you want me to tell you in 5 minutes how to clean up this dump of a store and why your products aren’t selling very well?  Honestly, maybe I should go to the next phone store.  Tell me now and quit wasting my valuable time or I’m leaving.”

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