2016 elections - because it's never too early

[Maximus]

There is nothing nefarious about it, it is just how our system is structured.

Why not both?

[Admiral Yi]

Both socialists and crony capitalists abuse the government regulations for their own competitive advantage.  Socialists abuse them to protect the working class, crony capitalists abuse them to protect the rich plutocrats.  It's preferable to not be at the either extreme.

Are socialists practicing crony capitalism when they do these things to protect members of the working class, such as taxi medallion owners and $80k/year teachers, or does it then get called something else?

[DGuller]

Both socialists and crony capitalists abuse the government regulations for their own competitive advantage.  Socialists abuse them to protect the working class, crony capitalists abuse them to protect the rich plutocrats.  It's preferable to not be at the either extreme.

Are socialists practicing crony capitalism when they do these things to protect members of the working class, such as taxi medallion owners and $80k/year teachers, or does it then get called something else?

No, it's still called socialism.  Teachers, even the ones earning $80k/year, are not plutocrats, and the entire taxi industry is very much not a plutocratic business, even if it does have some well-off actors.  Jimmy Hoffa may have been well-off, but he was still benefiting from socialist rather than crony capitalist elements.

[Admiral Yi]

No, it's still called socialism.  Teachers, even the ones earning $80k/year, are not plutocrats, and the entire taxi industry is very much not a plutocratic business, even if it does have some well-off actors.  Jimmy Hoffa may have been well-off, but he was still benefiting from socialist rather than crony capitalist elements.

Got it.

So a policy that makes all the employees of a company such as, for example, Enron, or Exxon-Mobil, better off, even though it might make a few rich people richer, is socialist?

[Berkut]

Since when is a teacher making 80k/year "working class"?

That is very much middle class in my world.

[DGuller]

No, it's still called socialism.  Teachers, even the ones earning $80k/year, are not plutocrats, and the entire taxi industry is very much not a plutocratic business, even if it does have some well-off actors.  Jimmy Hoffa may have been well-off, but he was still benefiting from socialist rather than crony capitalist elements.

Got it.

So a policy that makes all the employees of a company such as, for example, Enron, or Exxon-Mobil, better off, even though it might make a few rich people richer, is socialist?

No.  Employees can be here today, gone tomorrow.  They don't really have a reliable stake in the corruption, and they don't split the profits, except maybe for some crumbs.

Now, if they're unionized, then it can get blurry.  Was the Big Three oligopoly a product of socialism, or crony capitalism?  You can argue either way.  It enabled the UAW to have a more complete stranglehold over the companies, but it also protected the companies from competition.

[Valmy]

Got it.

So a policy that makes all the employees of a company such as, for example, Enron, or Exxon-Mobil, better off, even though it might make a few rich people richer, is socialist?

See this is why I hate Lenin. A policy is not socialist or capitalist based on who benefits. 'Crony Capitalism' is where capitalists gain advantages against their competition with political connections rather than the intended methods.

[DGuller]

Since when is a teacher making 80k/year "working class"?

That is very much middle class in my world.

I just googled the term "working class", and turns out it means manual labor.  So that's not quite what I intended to convey.  The relevant distinction is between people who derive their income mainly from working, or mainly from owning assets.

[Admiral Yi]

No.  Employees can be here today, gone tomorrow.  They don't really have a reliable stake in the corruption, and they don't split the profits, except maybe for some crumbs.

OK.  I thought you were saying taxi drivers extract rents from the medallion system, but now I see you are only talking about ownership.  However, on that note, any publicly traded company is going to have shareholders who are not plutocrats.  Does that mean by definition any policy that benefits that company is not a case of crony capitalism?

Now, if they're unionized, then it can get blurry.  Was the Big Three oligopoly a product of socialism, or crony capitalism?  You can argue either way.  It enabled the UAW to have a more complete stranglehold over the companies, but it also protected the companies from competition.

I think it was a function of economies of scale.

[Berkut]

Since when is a teacher making 80k/year "working class"?

That is very much middle class in my world.

I just googled the term "working class", and turns out it means manual labor.  So that's not quite what I intended to convey.  The relevant distinction is between people who derive their income mainly from working, or mainly from owning assets.

That strikes me as the dividing line between the wealthy and non-wealthy.

In a more income based metric, I think of "working class" as being a run right below "middle class", but I can see that it could be based more on the type of work done, rather than actual income, so a plumber might be "working class" even if they make a middle class income.

But in a strictly income hierarchy, anyone making $80k/year, in most places, is very much middle class. Even upper middle class in some areas.

[Admiral Yi]

See this is why I hate Lenin. A policy is not socialist or capitalist based on who benefits. 'Crony Capitalism' is where capitalists gain advantages against their competition with political connections rather than the intended methods.

I think this is very reasonable.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Except that it isn't true that overall the rich haven't won so many battles. The evidence directly refutes that:

With sharp analysis and an impressive range of data, Martin Gilens looks at thousands of proposed policy changes, and the degree of support for each among poor, middle-class, and affluent Americans. His findings are staggering: when preferences of low- or middle-income Americans diverge from those of the affluent, there is virtually no relationship between policy outcomes and the desires of less advantaged groups. In contrast, affluent Americans' preferences exhibit a substantial relationship with policy outcomes whether their preferences are shared by lower-income groups or not. Gilens shows that representational inequality is spread widely across different policy domains and time periods

I don't accept the methodology of his data.

[Martinus]

Since when is a teacher making 80k/year "working class"?

That is very much middle class in my world.

I just googled the term "working class", and turns out it means manual labor.  So that's not quite what I intended to convey.  The relevant distinction is between people who derive their income mainly from working, or mainly from owning assets.

That strikes me as the dividing line between the wealthy and non-wealthy.

In a more income based metric, I think of "working class" as being a run right below "middle class", but I can see that it could be based more on the type of work done, rather than actual income, so a plumber might be "working class" even if they make a middle class income.

But in a strictly income hierarchy, anyone making $80k/year, in most places, is very much middle class. Even upper middle class in some areas.

Wouldn't that depend on other cultural factors besides income?

[OttoVonBismarck]

I don't even use the term working class in a spectrum with upper class and middle class, it's a separate term for me that could span lower/middle/upper.

I disagree that employees are "here today gone tomorrow", profitable companies rarely switch out employs in large scale so quickly, ones that are struggling might lay people off en masse but it's a bitch to hire and train people and companies don't cut human capital as lightly as is often assumed--because it's bad business. So I reject the notion that a policy which benefits the 300,000 people that work for Verizon can only be called a rich person's policy. Plus when institutional pension funds and 401ks are a huge portion of the holders of shares outstanding in many public companies I thin it also puts to the lie that stockholders are all rich people.

I think crony capitalism is a real thing and I do think the rich have better access to politicians, but I think a lot of you guys are conflating things that benefit lots of people, some of whom are rich, and things that uniquely benefit the rich. Some of the current GOP candidate tax plans are a good example of plans that uniquely benefit the rich, they get the lion's share of the tax cuts, and some of the candidates are even proposing levying "mandatory minimum" contributions on the very poor (people who now pay effectively no income tax due to factors like the EITC.) That's an example of a "rich man's political issue." Policies that say, give tax credits to manufacturers are not (a policy Obama implemented), even though the CEOs of manufacturing firms are rich people.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Also it's worth noting middle class / upper middle class / upper class people have a far higher voter participation rate.

There's a pretty clear cut effect--the higher your income, the higher the voter participation rate. So even for purely democratic reasons it's no surprise that the issues of the upper middle class and the upper class get better treatment than the issues of the poorest Americans. Po people don't vote as much. Same reason old people get a lot of attention from politicians--they vote in disproportionately high numbers.