Saturday Learning Series: Jordan Peterson's Biblical series III

A further continuation of a brief revisit to the Saturday Learning Series, as Jordan Peterson continues his Biblical series.

Short term thinking - Part 3 - Will Capitalism Destroy Itself?

Will capitalism as it has currently evolved into a very significant focus on short term thinking, be able to compete with communist China where they at least work with 5 year plans and with projects like the Belt and Road Initiative take a very long term view? 

Long term thinking beats short term thinking every time - in the long run of course. But Capitalism itself is not destined or mandated to work under a short term thinking model.  That's a product of it's current iteration.  That has not always been the case.

The purpose of capitalism is to provide anyone the opportunity to respond to market needs, in a competitive environment, to allow the development of solutions to serve those needs as quickly and efficiently as possible. Those that respond the best will be rewarded with success.  Those who do not respond effectively will fail.

The market will move quickly. Options will become available quickly.  That's the advantage of capitalism. Central planning mandates a specific solution that may not be the best one. It's the only one though. It might be fast too, but there's no guarantee the marketplace will resolve what works.  With capitalism, what survives longer term is generally the best option.  What emerges at first probably gets improved upon either by the innovator or else a shrewd and hungry competitor.

That's the inherent advantage of capitalism over communism, socialism, feudalism, or any other form of governance; it leaves the market (i.e. everyone) free to make up their own minds and whatever serves the general good best, evolves as the winner. Capitalism is always subject to change.

But that is capitalism in general.  Somehow it evolved into short term thinking - annual bonuses, quarterly reports, news releases designed to sway perception of value. Human nature is the problem; the quick win, the short cut to victory (cheating, get rich quick schemes, crony capitalism whereby business and government work together to keep each other enriched or in power, even  pyramid schemes and Enron).  These things are not capitalism, they are not even a byproduct of capitalism but rather the result of human nature. Other systems have their own inherent issues that result from human nature and those might take a different form.  Not always - socialism and communism and monarchies are all as susceptible to corruption as is capitalism.

At least with capitalism you are allowed to think about what needs correction. It's pretty much human nature. Dominic Barton discusses the need for long term thinking and how it can be fixed.

The long term lens is the correct lens.  But implementing it does not resolve human nature and the desire to take short cuts.  All capitalism can do is try to work it's way through the potential short cuts and try to prevent them.  But the human nature component will never disappear. Just as we find new ways to thwart money laundering, new ways to money launder get developed.  It's a cycle that will repeat forever. Dominic Barton correctly points out that business does not need government to impose a solution.  Yes, some regulation is necessary, but business governance should as much as possible be left to business, and the marketplace that govern it.  That's the inherent advantage of capitalism and it should be leveraged, not eschewed.

Saturday Learning Series - The Psychological Significance of the Biblical stories (pt 3)

 Jordon Peterson's lecture series continued from last week.

How the Boomers screwed The West (part 3)

Part 3 in a mostly video analysis of how the Baby Boomers screwed the West. Part 1 here, and Part 2, here.  The purpose of this series is not to denigrate the Baby Boomers but to show what they got wrong, and why they got it wrong in the hope that future generations do not fall into the same trap.  It's like trying to avoid the inevitable but if we can reduce the frequency of the erroneous behaviors that lead to societal faltering, then we can still consider that a win.

To preface, Salon is a liberal organization they come at this with a liberal slant.  The author of the book A Generation of Sociopaths: How the Baby Boomers Betrayed America is also clearly a liberal.  Heck he even looks like Al Franken.  And there is plenty to critique in his book, but Bruce Cannon Gibney also gets a lot right.  He's not a Boomer himself, having been born in 1976.  I myself am also a Gen Xer and I have  a lot of respect for the generation prior to the Boomers, and for many Boomers for that matter.  I just don't want to see their mistakes repeated, even though it may be too late - one bad apple can spoil the whole bunch they say.  It seems to paraphrase Ronald Reagan , we're always one generation away from the extinction of freedom, as well as other important qualities in a society.

Saturday Learning Series - Defending Capitalism (Part 3)

A short episode defending capitalism unlike last week, however the video itself is quite substantial. Capitalism is not about greed. In defending capitalism, Jeffery Tucker argues that capitalism is about love.