Bernie Sanders "Democratic Socialist"

[mlsv2f]

How would I compete with walmart? I dont have the capital to compete. Whatever I offer, they can offer at a reduced price. If I find a niche market and its making money for me, they are going to see that, and can take that market away from me. 

 

 

 

 

Whole foods offers high end products

Kroger/Local Chains provides similar cost saving, but more variety and nicer feel

Organic Chain markets like Sprouts offer a health Niche

Trader Joes offers a mix between Sprouts/WalMart

Local markets offer a specialized local feel

Local Meat Markets offer specialized meat and butcher cuts you can't find elsewhere

Costco offers cheaper goods at a large scale than walmart

Target offers a bit nicer version of walmart

 

That's just for food, there is an endless amount of revenue creating business ventures that you can succeed with, as long with the option to go into various professional positions and attain wealth by making partner/C-Suite ect.

 

You can also have a regular career, work diligently and harder than the average person, be smart with your savings and retire with literally millions in your portfolio, especially if you are frugal in your early years. (I have a friend who is a personal trainer and will probably be retiring in his mid 50's with a couple million dollars based on the pace hes at)

 

Your inability to come up with a business plan to beat wal-mart is not justification for being able to steal from people, even when dead, because you want society (yourself in all reality) to have.

[neeeel]

 

 

Your inability to come up with a business plan to beat wal-mart is not justification for being able to steal from people, even when dead, because you want society (yourself in all reality) to have.

 

It wasnt meant as a justification for anything. I was simply asking a question. Nowhere did I say "I cant think of a way to beat walmart, therefore what we have now is the best system"

 

I am not sure that the things you listed compete directly with walmart? perhaps costco and target. 

 

I am trying to understand how, in a place where large corporations wield power through wealth, it is possible to compete with them, unless you also have wealth. 

 

perhaps you are right and my lack of vision consigns me to be a burger flipper for the rest of my life.

[Alan C.]

How would I compete with walmart? I dont have the capital to compete. Whatever I offer, they can offer at a reduced price. If I find a niche market and its making money for me, they are going to see that, and can take that market away from me. The point wasnt whether it was good or bad. It was that microsoft destroyed its competition, by offering its product for free. And it was only able to do that, because it was a bigger, richer corporation than netscape. Firefox and Chrome are free and are better , yes. How many people would pay for them, if theres an ok free alternative? 

 

I think that your concern is misplaced. You should be asking how you'd compete with government if you're concerned about destroying companies.

 

Microsoft didn't destroy Netscape. Consumers chose IE over Netscape.

 

Email "destroyed" the Post Office. Does that concern you?

[Thomasio]

The problem isn't finding a niche in the market, the problem is finding a piece of ground not owned by Walmart.

They aren't doing that right now, because there is no point in doing so, while government prevents them from using brute money force, but you may bet anything you like, without government Walmart would literally own all ground remotely suitable to build a shop on, just to prevent anyone from building anything they don't like.

They would freely rent houses to their customers, but they would make sure there cannot be competition.

[neeeel]

I think that your concern is misplaced. You should be asking how you'd compete with government if you're concerned about destroying companies.

 

Microsoft didn't destroy Netscape. Consumers chose IE over Netscape.

 

Email "destroyed" the Post Office. Does that concern you?

 

 

again, my concern is how all this would work in a free market. I make no statement as to whether it was good or bad for MS to give their product away for free. I make no statement as to whether government is good, bad or otherwise. I am trying to understand how a fully free market can allow competition in an area where there are already extremely powerful companies. 

 

I like thomasios example of how in a free market, walmart could buy up all suitable land to stop competition. I understand that this would significantly drive the price of nearby land up , until the last bits of land were so expensive that walmart wouldnt want to buy them, or couldnt afford them, but in that case, they are not available to anyone else either.

[cab21]

Ok, let's see.

If any accumulation of wealth is always forwarded within the same family, how could anyone from outside those families ever hope to compete with their power?

 

 

 

if a family is successful enough to increase wealth from generation to generation, other people only benefit from that.

other people can compete buy making something that others want more. there is no point in competing if you can't make something better and there is no need to feel like you have to directly compete with something you don't think you can make better

 

 

Only on the possibility that the offspring is too dumb to hire some managers who manage their wealth good enough?

 

that happens a lot, there are many rags to riches to rags stories.

one way to gain wealth would be to become a wealth manager, if you are making a great commission on how well you grow peoples money, these wealth managers grow a lot of wealth for themselves.

How could anyone from outside these families ever feel free, while those families dictate all the rules of all the markets simply because they have the monetary power to ruin any small competition?

 

these families don't dictate the rules and don't have the monetary power to ruin any small competition.

the consumers in the market have the power to choose what they consume.

How did Microsoft ruin Netscape?

Microsoft simply gave away their Internet Explorer for free and the small competition was gone in no time, because you just can't underbid a free offer if you depend on making at least a living from your product.

 

if someone though Netscape was better than Microsoft, they would pay for it.

there are all sorts of cases where people pay more for what they perceive as higher quality.

it's Netscape fault if they were not able to persuade customers to buy their product.

 

Whether you call it unfair or whatever, there simply is no chance to ever create a truly free society, if you allow the exponentially increasing wealth of a tiny minority.

the exponential increases wealth of a minority will exponential increase the wealth of the majority.

the poor used to not even have computers to be able to choose between Microsoft and Netscape. if they can have Microsoft for free, isn't that better than having to use their scarcer resources on Netscape, unless they think Netscape is worth the cost, in which they will pay.

 

You might get a whole lot of open source free projects going, like Linux, but anything remotely profitable will remain in the hands of the rich who accumulate ever more wealth over the generations.

it's not a zero sum game, everyone is getting more wealth here. if consumers like a new product better than what the rich offer, that will be made profitable.

 

If they buy and occupy all the land and refuse to sell any, how could anyone build anything?

 

that scenario is nonsense.

there is no way a person could buy all the land and refuse to sell it for one, it just is not going to happen.

 

as more land gets bought, the price of remaining land will go up, it would mean significant loses to buy the remaining land, and then the people would no longer have any wealth to buy more land.

[Mister Mister]

The problem isn't finding a niche in the market, the problem is finding a piece of ground not owned by Walmart.

They aren't doing that right now, because there is no point in doing so, while government prevents them from using brute money force, but you may bet anything you like, without government Walmart would literally own all ground remotely suitable to build a shop on, just to prevent anyone from building anything they don't like.

They would freely rent houses to their customers, but they would make sure there cannot be competition.

I'll take that bet, shall we say 100 Bitcoin?

[cab21]

The problem isn't finding a niche in the market, the problem is finding a piece of ground not owned by Walmart.

They aren't doing that right now, because there is no point in doing so, while government prevents them from using brute money force, but you may bet anything you like, without government Walmart would literally own all ground remotely suitable to build a shop on, just to prevent anyone from building anything they don't like.

They would freely rent houses to their customers, but they would make sure there cannot be competition.

 

 

that does not make sense

 

they would pay 20 thousands in rent so someone could buy say 3000 dollars of merchandise?

 

the cost of buying the land, or giving free rent to customers would put Walmart out of business.

 

the biggest land owner in the USA is the government, the biggest spender is the government, and the biggest confiscator of wealth is the government. the government is trillions of dollars in debt.

[Thomasio]

Why is it that a contract for a smartphone costs in USA roughly 50% more than the same contract costs in England?

Can you imagine that's because in England governement is preventing monopolys that dictate prices to the market, leaving smaller business a chance to compete, while in the US the big players have outcompeted and/or bought their competition?

Can you imagine how much money there is in maybe 200 million potential customers all paying 50% more for their contract and can you conclude from that estimate how much effort the big players would be willing to put in, to keep the monopoly on their profitable business?

 

That has nothing to do with providing a good service, not for Walmart nor for any other business, it's the power of a monopoly that allows them to dictate any price they want and if it requires buying all the land in a city, so be it.

 

Why would Walmart give any free rent to anyone, once they got a monopoly on the land, they would charge HUGE rent for all their properties and on top of that they would exclude renting anything to potential competition of their business.

 

Do you really not understand how big business works?

If you cannot beat them, buy them, that's all it takes.

[cab21]

Why is it that a contract for a smartphone costs in USA roughly 50% more than the same contract costs in England?

 

 can you show me these plans?

the ones that i looked at were just as expensive if not more expensive than American ones.

the plans in america that were 80$ were usually over 50 pounds in England, which is at least a 100% ratio.

 

so for a 50% ratio a 50$ plan in the usa would have to be a 16 pound plan in he UK. im not finding this when i look

 

 

 

Why would Walmart give any freee rent to anyone, once they got a monopoly on the land, they would charge HUGE rent for all their properties and on top of that they would exclude renting anything to potential competition of their business.

 

so then they would have no customers because noone would be able to afford being a customer, the business would then lose money and go out of business.

 

if one company charges too much, they won't be able to make any money and will lose the property and their business,

 

the people that make enough money to pay HUGE rent are not wallmart shoppers anyway, walmarts shoppers are usally poorer, so charging Huge rents will mean those people have to go to another company to purchase from.

[Thomasio]

can you show me these plans?

the ones that i looked at were just as expensive if not more expensive than American ones.

the plans in america that were 80$ were usually over 50 pounds in England, which is at least a 100% ratio.

 

so for a 50% ratio a 50$ plan in the usa would have to be a 16 pound plan in he UK. im not finding this when i look

 

I don't live in England not in USA and I don't even own a smartphone.

I picked up the info from the NY times, which I find reliable enough.

The article was published on august 23rd 2014.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/24/business/two-countries-two-vastly-different-phone-bills.html?_r=0

 

 

so then they would have no customers because noone would be able to afford being a customer, the business would then lose money and go out of business.

 

if one company charges too much, they won't be able to make any money and will lose the property and their business,

 

the people that make enough money to pay HUGE rent are not wallmart shoppers anyway, walmarts shoppers are usally poorer, so charging Huge rents will mean those people have to go to another company to purchase from.

And just who said they would be so expensive that nobody could afford it?

They would simply charge some 20% or 30% more than necessary, giving them the edge to extend their wealth, extend their field of business and buy even more of the country.

Exponentially increasing wealth is an unstoppable process where in the end one individual will own the whole planet.

[shirgall]

Why is it that a contract for a smartphone costs in USA roughly 50% more than the same contract costs in England?

 

Surface area of England = 0.050346 million square miles

Surface area of USA = 3.806 million square miles

 

4G cell phone coverage England = 73% of premises

4G cell phone coverage USA = 98% of premises

[AncapFTW]

Surface area of England = 0.050346 million square miles

Surface area of USA = 3.806 million square miles

 

4G cell phone coverage England = 73% of premises

4G cell phone coverage USA = 98% of premises

To be fair, we have terrible internet speeds in the US because they took tax money that the government gave them for extending the fiber network and used it to build 4g towers.

 

But yeah, the phones might be more because of the extreme difference in network size and coverage.

[cab21]

I don't live in England not in USA and I don't even own a smartphone.

I picked up the info from the NY times, which I find reliable enough.

The article was published on august 23rd 2014.

http://www.nytimes.c...bills.html?_r=0

 

the article points to several factors, but does not calculate how much of a factor britians price controls make, either in cost to consumer or in costs to plan providers.

the service providers in the usa have to spend a lot more money building a network than the uk service providers do.

the article does not show that the entire difference is the UK's price controls and force. even if by price controls and force against companies, the government makes the price a little cheaper for awhile, that does not give incentive for companies to pay money to make improvements to the network. the American companies have a better service in a larger area, while the uk companies have worse service in a smaller area.

 

And just who said they would be so expensive that nobody could afford it?

They would simply charge some 20% or 30% more than necessary, giving them the edge to extend their wealth, extend their field of business and buy even more of the country.

Exponentially increasing wealth is an unstoppable process where in the end one individual will own the whole planet.

 

20/30% more than necessary would mean the costumer would go to a competitor who is not charging 20/30% more than necessary

 

business expand, but there has yet to be a unstopable force, or even close to one individual owning the whole planet.

 

there are no big business where 100% of the stock is owned by 1 person.

[Thomasio]

20/30% more than necessary would mean the costumer would go to a competitor who is not charging 20/30% more than necessary

 

business expand, but there has yet to be a unstopable force, or even close to one individual owning the whole planet.

 

there are no big business where 100% of the stock is owned by 1 person.

 

There's no need to have all stocks in the hand of one individual, charging 20 or 30% more than neccessary only requires there to be no competition.

Those enterprises exist already, Microsoft might be the best example.

On the web and in business Linux has the edge, because it's free, but among home users MS-Windows ist the only choice.

Microsoft has tried anything they could to bind their operation system to specific hardware, because that means an OS will expire together with the computer it runs on.

 

In Germany the constitutional court has declared several times by now, binding software to hardware is illegal by German law.

That's why I enjoy the liberty of a Windows7 license I've been using at no extra cost for the last 4 or 5 computers I bought.

But M$ doesn't give up, just the opposite, they are getting smarter, trying any possible way to undermine the law and slip their quadrupling of price into the market.

Now they are offering a "free" upgrade from win7 and win8 to win10, while trying to hide the fact, the upgrade terminates the permanent license for the old OS, while the win10 license is valid only on the hardware it first gets installed on, or in other words, as soon as I buy a new computer, I have to buy a new OS.

At same time M$ actively seeks cooperation with hardware manufacturers, so they will sell computers with preinstalled windows, just to keep users away from the idea of installing the free Linux alternative.

 

Fairly obvious M$ cannot compete with a free system, but they found their way to keep the free alternative low and obviously there is no opportunity for making money with another OS, because M$ controls the market worldwide.

[Slavik]

I personally could never understand the left's cognitive dissonance when it comes to taxation.  On one hand they advocate for higher taxes on things like sugar drinks, fast food and cigarettes in order to reduce consumption, thus affirming the idea that "what you tax you get less of."  On the other hand, without taking a breath to pause, they advocate higher taxes on businesses. 

[Alan C.]

The problem isn't finding a niche in the market, the problem is finding a piece of ground not owned by Walmart. They aren't doing that right now, because there is no point in doing so, while government prevents them from using brute money force, but you may bet anything you like, without government Walmart would literally own all ground remotely suitable to build a shop on, just to prevent anyone from building anything they don't like.

 

The notion that Walmart would "buy up all the land" is hyperbolic nonsense. The amount of land that Walmart owns is a speck on a map compared to the amount of land that the government has annexed, yet you think Walmart is a threat. Nobody is forced to shop at Walmart; people do so willingly because they prefer it to the available alternatives. Walmart isn't going to "buy up all the land" and sit on it. Only governments do that.

 

Firms cannot enjoy limitless growth. No single firm can, or ever will, grow so large as to encompass a country or planet. The reason why is because as firms grow in size, their internal transaction costs become increasingly dissociated from market prices. Eventually, they become unable to calculate profit and loss and lose the ability to economize and determine if output exceeds input.

 

 

again, my concern is how all this would work in a free market. I make no statement as to whether it was good or bad for MS to give their product away for free. I make no statement as to whether government is good, bad or otherwise. I am trying to understand how a fully free market can allow competition in an area where there are already extremely powerful companies. 

 

I like thomasios example of how in a free market, walmart could buy up all suitable land to stop competition. I understand that this would significantly drive the price of nearby land up , until the last bits of land were so expensive that walmart wouldnt want to buy them, or couldnt afford them, but in that case, they are not available to anyone else either.

 

Large companies have the 'economies of scale' to absorb the costs of taxes, regulatory compliance, and lawsuits. Smaller companies don't. Taxes, regulations, and lawsuits are barriers put in place by governments, not markets. Those barriers create cartel and oligolopy-like conditions which allow large companies to thrive and grow larger. Without those cumbersome and onerous barriers, there would be more small companies, and more competition.

[cab21]

There's no need to have all stocks in the hand of one individual, charging 20 or 30% more than neccessary only requires there to be no competition.

 

how would one person own everything if that person did not have 100% of the stocks? not having 100% of the stocks literally means that the person does not own everything.

 

if there is not competition, than there is no such thing as "more than necessary". there are not innate prices.

 

 it's up to other people to create competition

 

Those enterprises exist already, Microsoft might be the best example.

 

 

microsoft has less than 100% of the market for anything microsoft does.

apple is a competitor, linux is a competitor, and so on

 

On the web and in business Linux has the edge, because it's free, but among home users MS-Windows ist the only choice.

Microsoft has tried anything they could to bind their operation system to specific hardware, because that means an OS will expire together with the computer it runs on.

 

consumers certainly have the option to choose linux, but many don't for various reasons. microsoft does not make this choice, the consumer makes it.

 

In Germany the constitutional court has declared several times by now, binding software to hardware is illegal by German law.

That's why I enjoy the liberty of a Windows7 license I've been using at no extra cost for the last 4 or 5 computers I bought.

But M$ doesn't give up, just the opposite, they are getting smarter, trying any possible way to undermine the law and slip their quadrupling of price into the market.

Now they are offering a "free" upgrade from win7 and win8 to win10, while trying to hide the fact, the upgrade terminates the permanent license for the old OS, while the win10 license is valid only on the hardware it first gets installed on, or in other words, as soon as I buy a new computer, I have to buy a new OS.

At same time M$ actively seeks cooperation with hardware manufacturers, so they will sell computers with preinstalled windows, just to keep users away from the idea of installing the free Linux alternative.

 

its fair for a business to try and get customers to buy form that business, just like the competition does.

it;s easy to create a computer that does not have any OS installed on it.

there are plenty of people giving reviews and feedback over thinking other OS are better than microsofts, so people are open to read that feedback and decide if they want to try a different OS. microsoft can't prevent other OS, microsoft can just try and build a system that is integrated, like Apple does.

 

Fairly obvious M$ cannot compete with a free system, but they found their way to keep the free alternative low and obviously there is no opportunity for making money with another OS, because M$ controls the market worldwide.

linux is making it's own choices, it has to find a way to compete. perhaps part of the linux philosophy itself does not make it gain market share.

the consumers control the market, microsoft is just one player that gives consumers a choice to buy microsoft products.

[andkon]

It was that microsoft destroyed its competition, by offering its product for free. And it was only able to do that, because it was a bigger, richer corporation than netscape.

 

Destroyed? They set arson fires? Customers could always buy Netscape. Customers did not buy Netscape, however. How is this "destruction"? One company apparently offered a better product, as judged by customers' preferences.

[neeeel]

 

Destroyed? They set arson fires? Customers could always buy Netscape. Customers did not buy Netscape, however. How is this "destruction"? One company apparently offered a better product, as judged by customers' preferences.

 

Ok, destroyed may be a bit fanciful and emotional, but it still stands that, by being able to offer their product for free, it removed any chance of netscape being able to compete

[shirgall]

As someone that works for Microsoft to make Linux run better in Microsoft's virtualization platform, I'm wondering how to comment on this thread without either appearing as a shill or a traitor.

[andkon]

Ok, destroyed may be a bit fanciful and emotional, but it still stands that, by being able to offer their product for free, it removed any chance of netscape being able to compete

 

Sure, if we assume Netscape is only browsers. Netscape could have raised revenue by expanding their services, even if they offered a free browser to match Microsoft's offer. Imagine if they made a good search engine on the Netscape homepage or any of the hundreds of ideas that other companies had around that time. They instead choose to stand still and not innovate.

[neeeel]

Sure, if we assume Netscape is only browsers. Netscape could have raised revenue by expanding their services, even if they offered a free browser to match Microsoft's offer. Imagine if they made a good search engine on the Netscape homepage or any of the hundreds of ideas that other companies had around that time. They instead choose to stand still and not innovate.

 

 

ok, that makes sense. I guess I am thinking of things as fairly static, A vs B, A wins, end of story. Thats probably a pretty hefty flaw in my thinking.

[Thomasio]

ok, that makes sense. I guess I am thinking of things as fairly static, A vs B, A wins, end of story. Thats probably a pretty hefty flaw in my thinking.

 

The flaw in that thinking is, that on start the argument is, small business can compete with big business through lower expenses.

When then an argument comes up, that proves how big business can easily kill small business, the argument becomes, in order to compete small business has to become bigger.

If an argument comes up pointing out how big business could exclude small business from a given product, the argument becomes, small business could produce something else.

The big flaw in there is, if a competetive business has to grow, the average size of any remotely successful business has to grow, which in a finite world leads to the ultimate state of one corporation owning the world.

If small business gets excluded from ever more branches of business, it is ultimately doomed to vanish completely.

[andkon]

The flaw in that thinking is, that on start the argument is, small business can compete with big business through lower expenses.

When then an argument comes up, that proves how big business can easily kill small business, the argument becomes, in order to compete small business has to become bigger.

If an argument comes up pointing out how big business could exclude small business from a given product, the argument becomes, small business could produce something else.

The big flaw in there is, if a competetive business has to grow, the average size of any remotely successful business has to grow, which in a finite world leads to the ultimate state of one corporation owning the world.

If small business gets excluded from ever more branches of business, it is ultimately doomed to vanish completely.

 

Yet:

1. large businesses started as small businesses and
2. there's millions of small businesses in America despite companies that have revenues in the hundreds of billions

Sometimes there's an advantage to being small and sometimes an advantage to being big (ie. economies of scale).

 

 

ok, that makes sense. I guess I am thinking of things as fairly static, A vs B, A wins, end of story. Thats probably a pretty hefty flaw in my thinking.

 

Now it's gone so that's good :-)

[mlsv2f]

I'm interested to understand how he only has a net worth of 300-400k as I keep seeing published?

Based on Congressional and Rep salaries, which are published and historically documented each year. He has made over 3.5 million dollars as a senator and rep since he was 49.

From age 39-49, he was a mayor, I'm assuming he made a decent living and saved some money there as well.

He graduated college at 22-so I would imagine he worked/saved a bit from 22-39

It doesn't really add up

Is he lying about his money or is he awful with money? (Probably both since hes a socialist politician hehe)

 

[Thomasio]

I have no clue how much he is worth and how he got there, but I wonder, even if it's true why would he be "awful with money"?

He might have financed education for his kids and grandkids, he might have given them extra money, like buying them a house or a car or something, all completely reasonable things to do.

After all there's no point in saving anything at old age, unless you're a Pharaoh from Egypt and believe you can carry your wealth over into your afterlife, there's way more sense in helping your children while your're still alive than saving it all and let them wait until you die.

 

Last but not least, as a socialist he is aware that money in the bank in times of zero interest where nobody is willing to invest anything anywhere is poison for the economy, only money in circulation keeps business going.

[mlsv2f]

" I have no clue how much he is worth" He is required to disclose his assets as part of being in congress as such, based on signed representations from him hes worth around 300k.

 

link-http://www.forbes.com/2006/11/17/senate-politics-washington-biz-wash_cx_jh_1120senate.html

 

Actually though, upon further review, he made about 1.8 Million in speaking affairs in 2015, so I have no idea how is getting away with this facade.

 

"Voters should be grateful for the government transparency laws that required Senator Bernie Sanders, a rival to Hillary Rodham Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination, to reveal how much he made last year in speaking engagement fees. The total is $1,867.42 for three appearances, a grand sum that is chump change in presidential politicking but enough for the senator to respectably donate the money to charity."

 

You're speculating on how he handles large some of money he has been paid as a government official over his lifetime, until you can provide evidence as such, speculation can't be argued for or/against.

 

Further, why is it okay for Bernie Sanders to use the millions he was given as a result of the state for his own personal spending, but anyone else he labels as a greedy capitalist? you mentioned earlier in this threat that inheriting money was parasitical, and should be stopped by government programs, why is this case different when it comes to Bernie giving away money to his family?

 

Regardless, his presentation of himself as a middle class guy is a fraud. Saying things like ,"I don't have any millionaire friends", when in fact, hes probably been paid 5 million from the state in his lifetime, and received a similar amount from speeches, is misleading.

[mlsv2f]

I really can't find what Bernie Sanders did for a living from 22-39 before he was elected mayor.

 

Thomasio, you seem to be a fan, do you have any idea?

[Thomasio]

I really can't find what Bernie Sanders did for a living from 22-39 before he was elected mayor.

 

Thomasio, you seem to be a fan, do you have any idea?

 

I'm sorry, I have no clue.

If I remember right, there's a video on YT, where he tells how he grew up and what he did, but I didn't pay attention, because for me isn't important what someone did in the distant past, important is for me what he did in the recent past and what he will do in the future.