• e$tGyr#J2pqM8v@feddit.nl
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    7 hours ago

    Race to the bottom vs. race to the top. Both are happening. Some are probably competing for most delicious lemonade, but only these two capitalists can afford it and the rest of us drink their piss. The idea of competition in order to race to the top is not a bad idea, and can be usefull in some contexts. It’s just that the race to the bottom is usually omitted, or presented as a positive rather than a negative. The idea being something like:

    capitalism leads to good things, capitalism leads to people drinking piss, ergo people drinking piss is a good thing.

  • untakenusername@sh.itjust.works
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    12 hours ago

    which is why we need anti piss-in-lemonade laws and limits on how much water there can be for a given number of lemons.

    we don’t need to remove capitalism, instead we can restrain it from harming people

    • NONE@lemmy.worldOP
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      6 hours ago

      we don’t need to remove capitalism, instead we can restrain it from harming people

      That’s what we’ve been telling ourselves for almost 200 years, and yet we are as we are…

    • Baylahoo@sh.itjust.works
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      11 hours ago

      Part of me agrees with you. The other part of me knows how well capitalism can pivot so much quicker than laws can be made to curtail the bad practices, that the system seems to be the issue. Maybe the government is the issue too, but it’s a lot of bad faith companies that ruins the bunch. Forward thinking and progressive thinking with quick measured action could do it, but most people who are elected aren’t capable of that or are too compromised to make anything work.

    • RQG@lemmy.world
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      11 hours ago

      Regulation could keep capitalism in check.

      In reality capitalists use their money to make and change laws through lobbyists or bribes, and by propaganda through owning all media.

      • Aux@feddit.uk
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        8 hours ago

        Not in reality, but in the US. Lobbying is called corruption elsewhere and is a crime. Don’t put this shit on capitalism, it’s a US only problem.

        • RQG@lemmy.world
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          2 hours ago

          We have all of that in the EU too. The US is just a few years ahead.

        • ximtor@lemm.ee
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          4 hours ago

          it’s a US only problem.

          Absolutely not. There more than enough lobbying and corruption in our all-so-democratic EU, just most of the population denying it based on “look how much worse the US is”

        • RQG@lemmy.world
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          2 hours ago

          It could but it’s hard with the capitalism power dynamics in place.

  • Lovable Sidekick@lemmy.world
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    17 hours ago

    There’s more lemonade by volume in Lemon Pledge furniture polish than in Country Time Lemonade.

    [That’s why the small print says “Lemonade flavored drink”]

  • masquenox@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    19 hours ago

    Competitions end. And when competitions end in a world where everything is “run like a business,” the winners are not handed medals, but monopolies.

    • WorldsDumbestMan
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      12 hours ago

      They are handed an extinction. Thanks for making a bunch of useless piles of paper.

    • dudinax@programming.dev
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      22 hours ago

      Monsanto secret memo, paraphrased: Our competitors are not our adversaries. They are our allies. The customer is our adversary.

      Disclosed during a price-fixing investigation.

      • sfled@lemm.ee
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        13 hours ago

        Lemon-scented Roundup® is tasty and nutritional, too!

  • pemptago@lemmy.ml
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    18 hours ago

    Every capitalist wants to invest as little and profit as much as possible.

    • A history of the world in seven cheap things (p.21)
  • IninewCrow@lemmy.ca
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    1 day ago

    More like … I own the sugar plantation so I can use as much sugar as I want … I can dump so much sugar into my lemon flavored water that it will be like selling crack to children. Once they’re hooked, these kids will beg their parents to buy my stuff for cheap … for the rest of their lives!

    The sugar laden crap I get them hooked on also causes diabetes which is why I also own the diabetes medication pharmaceutical where these kids will buy their drugs as diabetic adults.

    I’ll make money on these dumb kids through every stage of their miserable lives.

  • applemao@lemmy.world
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    22 hours ago

    Trying to explain this to people I know is nearly impossible. They always think “but when I’m rich I want all the money and no regulation!” Well guess what you work at Walmart and will never be rich so I guess let yourself get endlessly exploited then. There is no ethical billionaire. Maybe not even millionaire tbh.

    • CalipherJones@lemmy.world
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      17 hours ago

      At this point I don’t even consider 50 million net worth “rich”. There are 2 classes of people. Billionaires and their cronies, and everybody else.

      • jjjalljs@ttrpg.network
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        17 hours ago

        I think at around 5 million you no longer need to labor to live. You can put that in safe investments and just coast. That’s maybe not super rich, but it’s definitely above a milestone.

    • frezik@midwest.social
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      22 hours ago

      As things are, every Millennial and anyone in a later generation is going to have to be a millionaire to retire to a reasonable level of comfort. It could also be true that there are no ethical millionaires. Where does that leave us?

        • _goopy_@lemm.ee
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          20 hours ago

          Ditto. I am putting money away in my 401k like a good little citizen but I have no clue how that money will EVER be enough to support myself (not to mention any one else I might have around) in my old age.

    • markovs_gun@lemmy.world
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      19 hours ago

      It’s not that hard to be a millionaire by retirement if you have a decently good paying job. Assuming you’re making $84k a year (good money, but hardly “capitalist pig” level) and invest 6% of your income every year in your retirement account (~$5k a year) at a roughly 7% average interest rate (historical stock market average) for 40 years that gets you to $1mil.

  • 2ugly2live@lemmy.world
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    18 hours ago

    It should be "I used water, corn syrup, and yellow dye #65“ VS “I used piss.” Only “organics” use some of the real stuff, with some “natural” flavors.

  • MelodiousFunk@slrpnk.net
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    1 day ago

    Shout out to the $8 quart of ice water with half a lemon in it sold as “lemonade” at last year’s ren faire. Though I did get lemon-flavored melted ice for the next few hours out of the deal.

  • Avid Amoeba@lemmy.ca
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    1 day ago

    Should have an intermediate step where one of the competitors beats the other. Then the third should have only the remaining one, now big, and selling worse lemonade.