Started a new job last week. Haven't really started doing what I was hired to do (mostly been reading/watching/studying some of what I'll be using) but, hey, at least I'm employed now! And I should be doing some interesting stuff.
That means I have a lot less free time now, but that's okay. In celebration (and for my birthday) I bought a couple of books, and my brother gave me one as a birthday gift - The Enlightened Capitalists, which covers a topic I was very interested in. It discusses why and how some attempts to combine making money with doing good failed. It's something I'd like to believe is possible, but it's always worth finding out why/how previous attempts didn't work out.
Also picked up a book called The Regency Years, which is interesting. Has more parallels to today then I really expected, tbh. I picked it up for a couple of reasons... first, because we generally look at history in isolation (i.e. the Constitution, the Civil War, etc) and don't get a sense for all the massive number of events going on concurrently. Like the old canard about how samurai and cowboys existed around the same time. The second reason? Well... regency romance is a genre, probably because Jane Austen and Georgette Heyer wrote for that time period, and I wanted to know more about it.
Not sure how much reading I'll be doing right now, but I've enjoyed what I've gotten through so far.
The Enlightened Capitalists has been thought provoking, especially as it touches on the desire for control. It talked about how Carnegie originally was an Enlightened Capitalist, before reading something-or-other that made him think his ability to manage resources showed he shouldn't be (i.e. better to have the profits in his hands than to pay his people more, and then he got involved with union busting and using the Pinkerton agency and whatnot, only to later turn around and get into philanthropy.)
It's like... I'm *mostly* a capitalist. I don't believe in central planning, at least. Nobody can predict what goods and services will be needed ahead of time, and the market does a better job of it. (I also can see the point in rewarding people for highly desired and rare skills, like managing large organizations. It's just that I think there are limits, and when we're talking about record profits and falling wages, the specific situation requires something different. Or, well... I'd really rather people were wise enough to choose to do something different, but if they're all going to be stupid enough to ignore that then they'll get the unrest that anyone could predict, and on their own heads be it.)
I talked before about how people don't just roll over and die for lack of access to needed resources, but there are tons of stories already about people who need insulin - or other medical care - already doing that. Dying, that is. Like the rather depressing Twitter conversation where someone asked what event radicalized you against the US healthcare system.
I can see the need to invest money in research and development, to get new and better treatment. Sure. But if that's what's going on then I really don't expect to hear reports about massive profits. (Though, to be fair, since I always try to look for arguments disproving my biases, the profits may not be as massive as we think. Still, people are dying because their health care - if they have it - doesn't cover enough of the costs.)
I wonder sometimes, well. Retirement plans that give workers stock in the company they work for ought to give workers some sense of ownership/profit for making their company a success. Assuming they get that option in the first place. But when you reap the results decades down the road, and the stock price is affected by all sorts of other parts of the business, and maybe some idiot CEO comes along and destroys the value of the stock you own, the end result is that most workers don't really feel like they benefit from any such profit their company makes.
I dunno. It seems to me that there's more than one way to organize a system. Like, why make ourselves think inside the existing box? It's not just capitalism or socialism. Heck, much of Europe used to be feudal, and people back then would have a hard time imagining the world we live in today.
But before going further into that I probably ought to discuss something else... and that probably ought to be a separate post.
That means I have a lot less free time now, but that's okay. In celebration (and for my birthday) I bought a couple of books, and my brother gave me one as a birthday gift - The Enlightened Capitalists, which covers a topic I was very interested in. It discusses why and how some attempts to combine making money with doing good failed. It's something I'd like to believe is possible, but it's always worth finding out why/how previous attempts didn't work out.
Also picked up a book called The Regency Years, which is interesting. Has more parallels to today then I really expected, tbh. I picked it up for a couple of reasons... first, because we generally look at history in isolation (i.e. the Constitution, the Civil War, etc) and don't get a sense for all the massive number of events going on concurrently. Like the old canard about how samurai and cowboys existed around the same time. The second reason? Well... regency romance is a genre, probably because Jane Austen and Georgette Heyer wrote for that time period, and I wanted to know more about it.
Not sure how much reading I'll be doing right now, but I've enjoyed what I've gotten through so far.
The Enlightened Capitalists has been thought provoking, especially as it touches on the desire for control. It talked about how Carnegie originally was an Enlightened Capitalist, before reading something-or-other that made him think his ability to manage resources showed he shouldn't be (i.e. better to have the profits in his hands than to pay his people more, and then he got involved with union busting and using the Pinkerton agency and whatnot, only to later turn around and get into philanthropy.)
It's like... I'm *mostly* a capitalist. I don't believe in central planning, at least. Nobody can predict what goods and services will be needed ahead of time, and the market does a better job of it. (I also can see the point in rewarding people for highly desired and rare skills, like managing large organizations. It's just that I think there are limits, and when we're talking about record profits and falling wages, the specific situation requires something different. Or, well... I'd really rather people were wise enough to choose to do something different, but if they're all going to be stupid enough to ignore that then they'll get the unrest that anyone could predict, and on their own heads be it.)
I talked before about how people don't just roll over and die for lack of access to needed resources, but there are tons of stories already about people who need insulin - or other medical care - already doing that. Dying, that is. Like the rather depressing Twitter conversation where someone asked what event radicalized you against the US healthcare system.
I can see the need to invest money in research and development, to get new and better treatment. Sure. But if that's what's going on then I really don't expect to hear reports about massive profits. (Though, to be fair, since I always try to look for arguments disproving my biases, the profits may not be as massive as we think. Still, people are dying because their health care - if they have it - doesn't cover enough of the costs.)
I wonder sometimes, well. Retirement plans that give workers stock in the company they work for ought to give workers some sense of ownership/profit for making their company a success. Assuming they get that option in the first place. But when you reap the results decades down the road, and the stock price is affected by all sorts of other parts of the business, and maybe some idiot CEO comes along and destroys the value of the stock you own, the end result is that most workers don't really feel like they benefit from any such profit their company makes.
I dunno. It seems to me that there's more than one way to organize a system. Like, why make ourselves think inside the existing box? It's not just capitalism or socialism. Heck, much of Europe used to be feudal, and people back then would have a hard time imagining the world we live in today.
But before going further into that I probably ought to discuss something else... and that probably ought to be a separate post.
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