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Mostrando postagens com marcador capitalismo. Mostrar todas as postagens
Mostrando postagens com marcador capitalismo. Mostrar todas as postagens

09 fevereiro 2024

Capitalismo e Caridade

Scott Alexander, no astralcodexten.com, apresenta algumas reflexões interessantes sobre capitalismo e caridade. É um texto comparativo entre os dois para tentar chegar a resposta de qual é o melhor. Parece algo estranho a comparação, mas não tanto quando lemos o texto. Vou tentar resumir os argumentos dele a seguir.


Inicialmente parece inegável que os países que ficaram ricos, assim o fizeram a partir do capitalismo. Isto inclui, por exemplo, os Estados Unidos, a Alemanha e, mais recentemente, a Coreia e Japão. Aqueles que tentaram outro caminho aparentemente fracassaram, como é o caso notório da extinta União Soviética. Se existem pessoas boas no mundo e estas querem ajudar os outros, talvez seja interessante deixar de lado a caridade, pura e simples, e passar a “doar para o capitalismo”. 

Algumas opções que podem incluir a doação para capitalismo: gastar o dinheiro com algo desejável e com empresas eficientes ou doe para instituições que busquem promover o capitalismo de alguma forma. 


A partir desta ideia, Alexander comparar gastar dinheiro com Instacart – uma espécie de Uber de compras, versus uma instituição de caridade que promove água potável para população carente. Esta instituição de caridade é uma escolha do GiveWell, o que significa, em outras palavras, que é algo sério. Se você tivesse um milhão para gastar para fazer o bem, qual seria a melhor opção? O senso comum escolheria a entidade do terceiro setor. Mas Alexander mostra que “doar” para o capitalismo pode criar empregos, promove uma empresa que tem uma continuidade clara, há efeitos de segunda ordem (o salário do empregado da Instacart gera outros benefícios indiretos), há um retorno do investimento, entre outros aspectos. 

Portanto, diante dessas considerações, a abordagem proposta por Scott Alexander nos leva a repensar a tradicional dicotomia entre caridade e capitalismo. A sugestão de investir no capitalismo como uma forma de impacto social, ao criar empregos, gerar benefícios indiretos e promover a continuidade de empresas eficientes, oferece uma perspectiva intrigante.


Entretanto, a carência de entidades do terceiro setor que promovam o capitalismo de maneira séria apresenta um desafio significativo. Nesse contexto, surge a indagação sobre a possibilidade de entidades como o sistema CFC desempenharem esse papel crucial. Seria o momento de repensar o papel das organizações não governamentais e filantrópicas, buscando formas inovadoras de promover sua contribuição para a vida das pessoas. 

Foto: aqui, aqui e aqui

16 julho 2015

Livro é coisa de rico

Vocês ouviram falar sobre a Lei do Preço Fixo? Com ela, os lançamentos deverão ser vendidos pelo preço de tabela por, no míimo, um ano. Se a livraria quiser fazer promoção está limitada a 10%.

Primeiro leiamos um trecho de uma postagen do blog Amigos do Livro, depois um vídeo do Danilo, do Cabine Literária:
1) Quem é a favor da lei do preço fixo argumenta que onde ela foi instituída estaria ajudando a preservar as pequenas e médias livrarias e a regular o mercado, tornando-o mais justo e saudável. Dizem, ainda, que ela contribui para garantir a diversidade e o plurarismo cultural e que, no final das contas, isso também influiria positivamente nos preços dos livros. 
2) Já quem é contra o preço fixo defende que o que deve prevalecer é a lei do livre mercado. De acordo com esses, as livrarias e os demais pontos de venda (magazines, hipermercados, internet etc.) devem ter a liberdade para dar os descontos que bem entenderem e competirem entre si – é isso que, no final das contas, dizem, beneficia o consumidor.
O trecho é de uma postagem antiga porque este assunto vem sendo discutido desde 2007. Mas o papo voltou com força por causa de alguns debate. Parece ter começado na Flip e ter continuado no Senado no dia 30 de junho. Eu que estou com uma meta de ler cem livros este ano (desafio GoodReads) e ando um tanto afastada da internet, só fiquei sabendo disso hoje. Meros 15 dias de atraso... E levei um &%$# susto! A história está cheia de apoiadores! Aposto que nenhum dele lê! Hunf.

Eu pergunto mas imagino a resposta (e ao mesmo tempo não quero confirmação): Será que os sebos estão sujeitoss? E os sebos online? Se eu quiser vender um livro que é lançamento na Estante Virtual, vou ter que colocar o preço de tabela!? Vou fazer questão de colocar por R$ 1,99. E é por essas e outras que o nosso Brasil não vai pra frente. Livros caros em um país sem o costume de ler só vai fazer com que haja ainda menos leitura. E com todo mundo alienado... nem vou continuar a frase.

Enfim, concordo com o Danilo (no vídeo abaixo). Ele aponta diversos problemas com essa lei e como estou muito brava vou deixar que ele fale também por mim.



Como eu vou viver sem aqueles descontos tão lindos que ocorrem no Black Friday!? Como???

26 junho 2015

Paul Tudor Jones II: Por que precisamos repensar o capitalismo

Paul Tudor Jones II ama o capitalismo. É um sistema que fez muito bem a ele nas últimas décadas. No entanto, este gestor de fundos de cobertura e filantropo está preocupado que o foco excessivo nos lucros esteja, como ele diz, "ameaçando os fundamentos da sociedade". Nesta palestra reflexiva e apaixonante, ele delimita seu plano de contra-ataque, que se baseia no conceito de "justeza".

Com legenda em português.

09 março 2015

10 mitos sobre economias de livre mercado

Free markets, capitalism and economics are often surrounded by misconceptions. Here are 10 myths about economics that either don’t stand up to further scrutiny or are just downright wrong, but which continue to dominate discussions surrounding the topic.

1. Greed is all economists care about, right?

10 Persistent Myths About Free Market Economics
imgur.com / Via imgur
Wrong. Supporters of free markets are often accused of believing that ‘greed is good’. Greed is not good, and economists do not believe that greed is necessary for capitalism to flourish. What economists do believe is that self-interest is a powerful motivator when it comes to financial transactions. No one denies the wide range of feelings that motivate us to act in certain ways, nor does anyone deny that people often make sacrifices for others and are altruistic. The beauty of free markets is that they work, regardless of whether people are greedy or selfless.

2. Oh, and economic growth

10 Persistent Myths About Free Market Economics
s3-ak.buzzfeed.com / Via buzzfeed
“Addicted to growth”“GDP fetishism” and “the crack-cocaine of economic indicators”, are just some of the phrases used to convey society’s supposedly unhealthy fixation with Gross Domestic product (GDP). But no politician or economist has ever expressed support for the ‘growth at all costs’ mantra that is alleged to be central to ‘neo-liberalism’. Far from the be all and end all, GDP is an economic indicator just like employment and inflation. If governments aimed to maximise GDP alone, we would have a much smaller state, huge tax cuts, no planning system, no carbon-reduction targets, legalised drugs, no immigration controls whatsoever and extremely limited regulation.

3. The rich get richer while the poor get poorer

10 Persistent Myths About Free Market Economics
giphy.com / Via Giphy
The concern that the rich are getting richer while the poor become poorer is a myth that has been around for many years but is false - or at least only half-true. The rich certainly get richer, but so do the poor. Over a century’s worth of growth has led to a steady rise in wages across the board and government figures show that between 1977 and 2012, the incomes of the poorest fifth of Britons rose by 93 per cent(adjusted for inflation). Much of this is made up of benefits, but wages have also risen significantly. Since 1986, the hourly wages of the poorest fifth of workers has risen by 49 per cent (adjusted for inflation).

4. We are working longer and longer hours

We are working longer and longer hours
stats.oecd.org / Via OECD stats
In 1900, British workers spent roughly 3,000 hours a year on the job. Compare this to the present day, when individuals in most of the world’s developed societies each work fewer than 1,800 hours a year. It is a common misconception that we are all working longer, but average working hours for British employees continues to fall. According to OECD figures, over half UK employees work less than 40 hours a week and fewer than 12% work more than 50 hours a week. Some people on high incomes have seen their working week increase but this is not the norm.

5. Inequality is on the rise…

Inequality is on the rise...
ONS (2014a) The effects of taxes and benefits on household income, 2012/13. 26 June.
From Russell Brand to Thomas Piketty, commentators love to remind us that the UK suffers from spiralling inequality, which, if we’re not careful, will revert us back to Victorian extremes. Claims such as these are misleading at best. By any conventional measure, income inequality peaked in Britain in 1990 and has been flat or falling ever since. It is currently lower than it has been for nearly 30 years.

6. …while social mobility is falling

10 Persistent Myths About Free Market Economics
Giphy.com / Via Giphy
The majority of those born poor swiftly move up the income ladder and almost all become wealthier than their parents, contrary to the beliefs of the Polly Toynbees of this world. Far from grinding to a halt, social mobility in the UK is better than it has ever been before and, as a recent study from Oxford University concluded, ‘with relative just as with absolute rates, there is no evidence at all to support the idea of mobility in decline.’

7. We’ve got all we can from economic growth, so let’s focus on the simpler things in life.

10 Persistent Myths About Free Market Economics
Giphy.com / Via Giphy
Sceptics of further economic growth should bear in mind the benefits to be had from ongoing prosperity. Not only does money allow us to pursue our goals and enjoy the fruits of our labour but it is also a consequence of human ingenuity and ambition. What’s more, the ever widening welfare state isn’t going to pay for itself. So perhaps we can afford a little more optimism.

8. Money doesn’t buy happiness after all

10 Persistent Myths About Free Market Economics
giphy.com / Via Giphy
Surely the failure of aggregate happiness to rise as everyone gets wealthier is proof that pursing growth is pointless? Not necessarily, no. A number of studies have shown not only that rich people are happier than poorer people, but that countries tend to become happier as they become richer. Of course, people’s aspirations rise as they and the people around them achieve better living standards, and this is a good thing. Most, though not all, happen to think that having a better income allows them to do what they want to do. So money isn’t an obstacle to a good life – it facilitates it!

9. Inequality is bad for your health, literally

10 Persistent Myths About Free Market Economics
Giphy.com / Via Giphy
It is sometimes claimed that high rates of income inequality are associated with a number of negative social outcomes, including lower life expectancy. This claim was first made by the sociologist Richard Wilkinson in the early 1990s but subsequent research contradicted it. Wilkinson later co-authored a book - The Spirit Level - which popularised the theory while ignoring all the evidence to the contrary. The Spirit Level includes a graph which appears to show a negative correlation between inequality and life expectancy, but the graph uses old data and excludes a number of countries which don’t fit the pattern. If up-to-date data are used - or if the full complement of countries is shown - the correlation (funnily enough) disappears.

10. We’re heading back to the 1930s

We’re heading back to the 1930s
Picasa / Via peterberthoud.co.uk
We are far richer today than we were in the 1930s and GDP is many times higher, so it is meaningless to compare government spending today with that in the 30s. Even if the government meets its target, it will still be spending eight times more than the government of 1935 (adjusted for inflation). And, as a proportion of GDP, the figure will only be slightly lower than it was in 2001 - hardly The Road to Wigan Pier. And with a growing economy, why shouldn’t spending as a proportion of GDP fall? Demonstrating fiscal responsibility is a far cry from condemning us all to a life of poverty and destitution.



Fonte: aqui

24 dezembro 2014

Ascensão e declínio das Leis Gerais do Capitalismo


Abstract:

Thomas Piketty's (2014) book, Capital in the 21st Century, follows in the tradition of the great classical economists, like Marx and Ricardo, in formulating general laws of capitalism to diagnose and predict the dynamics of inequality. We argue that general economic laws are unhelpful as a guide to understand the past or predict the future, because they ignore the central role of political and economic institutions, as well as the endogenous evolution of technology, in shaping the distribution of resources in society. We use regression evidence to show that the main economic force emphasized in Piketty's book, the gap between the interest rate and the growth rate, does not appear to explain historical patterns of inequality (especially, the share of income accruing to the upper tail of the distribution). We then use the histories of inequality of South Africa and Sweden to illustrate that inequality dynamics cannot be understood without embedding economic factors in the context of economic and political institutions, and also that the focus on the share of top incomes can give a misleading characterization of the true nature of inequality.

Autores: Daron Acemoglu (MIT) e James Robinson(Harvard)

Artigo Completo:The Rise and Decline of General Laws of Capitalism

25 julho 2014

A desigualdade vem diminuindo no mundo

Income Inequality Is Not Rising Globally. It's Falling.
The New York Times, JULY 19, 2014

Income inequality has surged as a political and economic issue, but the numbers don’t show that inequality is rising from a global perspective. Yes, the problem has become more acute within most individual nations, yetincome inequality for the world as a wholehas been falling for most of the last 20 years. It’s a fact that hasn’t been noted often enough.
The finding comes from a recent investigation by Christoph Lakner, a consultant at the World Bank, and Branko Milanovic, senior scholar at the Luxembourg Income Study Center. And while such a framing may sound startling at first, it should be intuitive upon reflection. The economic surges of China, India and some other nations have been among the most egalitarian developments in history.
Of course, no one should use this observation as an excuse to stop helping the less fortunate. But it can help us see that higher income inequality is not always the most relevant problem, even for strict egalitarians. Policies on immigration and free trade, for example, sometimes increase inequality within a nation, yet can make the world a better place and often decrease inequality on the planet as a whole.
International trade has drastically reduced poverty within developing nations, as evidenced by the export-led growth of China and other countries. Yet contrary to what many economists had promised, there is now good evidence that the rise of Chinese exports has held down the wages of some parts of the American middle class. This was demonstrated in a recent paper by the economists David H. Autor of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, David Dorn of the Center for Monetary and Financial Studies in Madrid, and Gordon H. Hanson of the University of California, San Diego.
At the same time, Chinese economic growth has probably raised incomes of the top 1 percent in the United States, through exports that have increased the value of companies whose shares are often held by wealthy Americans. So while Chinese growth has added to income inequality in the United States, it has also increased prosperity and income equality globally.
The evidence also suggests that immigration of low-skilled workers to the United States has a modestly negative effect on the wages of American workers without a high school diploma, as shown, for instance, in research by George Borjas, a Harvard economics professor. Yet that same immigration greatly benefits those who move to wealthy countries like the United States. (It probably also helps top American earners, who can hire household and child-care workers at cheaper prices.) Again, income inequality within the nation may rise but global inequality probably declines, especially if the new arrivals send money back home.
From a narrowly nationalist point of view, these developments may not be auspicious for the United States. But that narrow viewpoint is the main problem. We have evolved a political debate where essentially nationalistic concerns have been hiding behind the gentler cloak of egalitarianism. To clear up this confusion, one recommendation would be to preface all discussions of inequality with a reminder that global inequality has been falling and that, in this regard, the world is headed in a fundamentally better direction.
The message from groups like Occupy Wall Street has been that inequality is up and that capitalism is failing us. A more correct and nuanced message is this: Although significant economic problems remain, we have been living in equalizing times for the world — a change that has been largely for the good. That may not make for convincing sloganeering, but it’s the truth.
A common view is that high and rising inequality within nations brings political trouble, maybe through violence or even revolution. So one might argue that a nationalistic perspective is important. But it’s hardly obvious that such predictions of political turmoil are true, especially for aging societies like the United States that are showing falling rates of crime.
Furthermore, public policy can adjust to accommodate some egalitarian concerns. We can improve our educational system, for example.
Still, to the extent that political worry about rising domestic inequality is justified, it suggests yet another reframing. If our domestic politics can’t handle changes in income distribution, maybe the problem isn’t that capitalism is fundamentally flawed but rather that our political institutions are inflexible. Our politics need not collapse under the pressure of a world that, over all, is becoming wealthier and fairer.
Many egalitarians push for policies to redistribute some income within nations, including the United States. That’s worth considering, but with a cautionary note. Such initiatives will prove more beneficial on the global level if there is more wealth to redistribute. In the United States, greater wealth would maintain the nation’s ability to invest abroad, buy foreign products, absorb immigrants and generate innovation, with significant benefit for global income and equality.
In other words, the true egalitarian should follow the economist’s inclination to seek wealth-maximizing policies, and that means worrying less about inequality within the nation.
Yes, we might consider some useful revisions to current debates on inequality. But globally minded egalitarians should be more optimistic about recent history, realizing that capitalism and economic growth are continuing their historical roles as the greatest and most effective equalizers the world has ever known. 
Tyler Cowen is professor of economics at George Mason University.
The Upshot provides news, analysis and graphics about politics, policy and everyday life. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter.
A version of this article appears in print on July 20, 2014, on page BU6 of the New York edition with the headline: All in All, a More Egalitarian World.