economics help please?

Question

How does the role of the individual differ under capitalism, socialism and communism?? please help im doing homework and i cannot find anything about any of this

Answer 1

Capitalism means: You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull.

Socialism means: You have two cows. The government owns them and lets you keep the milk.

Communism means: You have two cows. The government owns them and sells you the milk.

And while I'm on the subject:

Bureaucracy means: You have two cows. The government shoots one, milks the other one and pours the milk down the drain.

Fascism means: You have two cows. The government takes them and shoots you.

Sharia law means: You have two cows. The government makes you dress in a burqa, then it chops your hands off, and then the Americans invade the country and shoot you.

Populism means: You have two cows. Nobody knows who owns them and nobody cares as long as she's got big ti ts.

Answer 2

Under Capitalism, all property is in private hands. Each individual is free to use the property in any way that he/she wishes.

People are free to TRADE their property with each other.
These trades create PRICES.
Out of these prices, PROFITS & LOSSES are created.

Profits and Losses are the lifeblood of civilization. Here's why:

We live in a world with scarce resources. In other words, wood is scarce, coal is scarce, oil is scarce, even human labor is scarce.

Being that this is the case, the main question of economics is: "Where should we apply our Earth's scarce resources."

Capitalism is the only economic system that can provide the answer. And it does so through Profits and Losses.

Profits tell property owners: "Apply your resources here. This is where the demand is!"

Losses, on the other hand, tell property owners: "Remove your resources from this area and apply them where the demand is higher."

So Capitalism, which means private property, trade, prices, and profits and losses answer the main economic question.

Communism and Socialism fail miserably. Here's why:

Under Communism and Socialism all property is in the hands of the government. They then try to allocate resources according to some "central plan." In other words, this small group of individuals try to plan everyone's life.

It always results in MASSIVE poverty. But why?

Well, if there is only one property owner (the government) it means that private property does not exist. Since private property does not exist, it means PRICES do not exist. After all, in order to have prices, you need at least 2 property owners. Since government is the only property owner, it can't trade with itself.

Since prices do not exist, it means Profits and Losses do not exist as well.

And as was mentioned earlier, Profits and Losses are the lifeblood of civilization.

Since, under Communism and Socialism, profits and losses do not exist, the central planners have absolutely no idea what to do with all of the resources. They have no way of knowing what should go where.

The Soviet Union was a glaring example for the whole world to see. The shelves were empty....Massive...Massive poverty.

So as you can see...the main consideration for the individual in both Capitalism and Communism/Socialism is the issue of property.

Under Capitalism, all property is privately owned. Under Communism/Socialism, a couple of people known as the government try to own it all.

Sadly, genuine Capitalism is yet to exist in mankinds history. It has only existed in piecemeal amounts. And where it has existed, mankind has moved forward in leaps and bounds.

Even though the U.S. is considered a Capitalist society, we are a long ways away. Hopefully someday we'll get there completely.

Answer 3

Economically speaking only. Capitalism is set up so to kill off the weaker and allow only the strong to continue, sounds bad to Americans mostly because we've been trained to care about all (especially the underdog) but it is actually a system with many good facets.

The idea is that an employer has a job for which there are many people who need money. Those people each vie for the job so they can get the money. The employer wants to pay as little as possible for as much work as possible while the worker wants to do as little work as possible for as much money as possible. The idea is that the worker will refuse to work until the employer offers enough money to make the work worthwhile. So the employer keeps offering more and more money until one of the workers accepts the job, and that is what the job is considered worth. Now this is supposed to happen with more than one employer offering the same job and it is assumed that all the jobs will be filled at approximately the same pay rate (that is most of the workers will feel the job is worth at least the rate that the first one accepted it at and so the job becomes worth that much). That is then considered a fair price paid for the workers skills, which the worker sets by factoring in cost-of-living, amount of work put into obtaining that skill, and amount of labor involved to do the job.

It can be a good idea but that is only if the employer is willing to pay that amount of money and is willing to offer it before the workers start starving, otherwise it can end up in a worker revolution. Which is why America is not a true capitalistic society but modified by the government, who keeps an eye on things with things like minimum wage (forcing the employer to pay at least that much for the worker's living rather than what used to happen in America with 5 cents an hour wages, no benefits, and long hours sometimes up to 20 hours per day), benefits like insurance and vacation, and limited work hours and overtime when the employer needs more than the allotted 40 hours per week.

Now as to the worker revolution that is socialism. It was believed by the communists that the employers would refuse to pay what the worker was worth because of their own selfishness. It was also assumed that the worker in capitalism would be too weak to fight the issue because he's got to eat, so he would accept lower than what he was worth, and then because of that be kept in abject poverty. This wasn't without reason, America was headed in that direction until the unions rose and fought with strikes.

But the socialists believed the only way this would be resolved is if the workers rose up in violent revolution and took away the businesses from the owners, then gave those businesses to a government ruled by a council similar to Congress (basically representatives of the people from various areas of the country and no president). The government would then hand out the jobs and pay everyone equally so that no one would starve because there would be no rich or poor, only equals. After the violent revolutions to take the businesses and the violent purges afterwards to expunge any bourgoisie (the former business owners or rather the rich) that may have survived the revolutions, it was believed all people would be equal and no one greater than anyone else, thus ending violence forever. They believed violence stemmed from an attempt by lower classes in poverty to rise to equality and from upper classes trying to keep the poor "in their place."

It was assumed this would work better because they believed if any one of the representatives tried to gain power the other representatives would stop him. What happened in the Soviet Union is that Stalin tried to take the power, Trotsky tried to stop him, and Stalin twisted the situation to make it look like Trotsky was the one trying to take power and forced him out. Stalin was then given power as it was believed he was the one to protect them from the United States. Therefore facism was established instead of communism and the dictatorship the Soviet Union was known for was set up.

As far as the individual's role in this communistic setup, he was supposed to work as hard as he could (all were supposed to) and all received what was necessary to live on, and if everyone were equal, no one would try to rise up and no one would try to keep the risers down and so violence would end forever along with poverty.

Answer 4

The individual under capitalism works for himself (every man has his "birthright"). Under communism, he works for the betterment of the government (its the WHOLE that counts). Socialism is inbetween.

Answer 5

Capitalism-you work to better yourself. Socialism-you work to better society. Communism-you work to strengthen the state.

Answer 6

you have to define others first..

Socialism = concentrate on social interest (depends on society needs)
Communism = concentrate on equal interest (no winners at all)
Capitalism = concentrate on capital interest (winners take all)


However, all are corrupted.

Answer 7

go to wikepedia.com