this post was submitted on 03 Nov 2023
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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Why? Isn't this just capitalism? They're just using algorithms to squeeze us further.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Well, as you've likely noticed, capitalism only works a theoretical construct. It makes the assumption of an 'ideal' market, which very much violates the laws of physics. As a result, no country actually employs unregulated capitalism.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Adam Smith wanted regulated capitalism.

Free market capitalism was never his idea. That's robber barons like Jeff that promoted that shit and came up with the idea.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

i don’t think it works even in a theoretical context. like you said, it requires assumptions that violate the laws of physics. i don’t think that’s a great starting place for any political/economic system.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Well, I did write construct, not context. So, yeah, I do mean that you need to make up a fundamentally different reality (where everything happens in a singularity) for it to then potentially work as the theories say.

And while we can have arguments on whether those theories with fundamentally wrong axioms can still be mapped to reality, monopolization is a very obvious example where it falls apart and we do need regulation from the outside.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

oh i misread that the first time. yeah i completely agree. i was even thinking of saying the thing about monopolies in my comment, i think it’s a pretty good example of how things start to fall apart.

making up fundamentally different realities does sound like fun though, just not for the purposes of trying to justify capitalism.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

Depends on your definition of "capitalism".

This is not supposed to happen in a market economy, as you have in developed countries. Many people define "capitalism" as being, more or less, that system.

A narrower definition of "capitalism" is private control of the means of production. In that sense, "capitalism" is at odds with a market economy, which is one reason why that private control is limited in many ways in developed countries.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That’s literally the argument Amazon is making. They have said the Nessie tool is just for market analysis and doesn’t do 90% of what it’s are accused of doing 🙄

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Sadly this is exactly what capitalism is though, and the government allows them to do worse

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

These companies own 80% of them. The other 20% are already bought by someone else.