Do you know what was the resulting effect? Corporations paid MORE to employees and invested more in "research & development". They decided that instead of paying MORE to the Govt. in taxes, might as well PAY EMPLOYEES MORE and increase productivity.
These days, all the money/profits goes into STOCK BUYBACKS and artificially increasing stock prices and pay packages of "upper management", CEOs, and Board Members.
BTW, this is JUST ONE example of how incentives can work. There are many more throughout history.
It was called "The Red Scare" for a reason. There was NO REAL THREAT - it was a manufactured narrative - Communists (and they were NOT Communists in reality - Stalin NEVER was) were not going to destroy and conquer the Americas. It was geopolitics, empire games, and Capitalism.
>>"at the discretion of bankers, paid employees more during a time period when - rightly or wrongly - a second or alternative system was still out there in the world"
Seriously? Is that the narrative you CHOOSE to believe? That there was REAL Communism? And that it was a REAL threat?
I suggest studying American economic history to understand the motivations behind different policies (and the resulting changes in socio-economic classes) rather than believing false narratives propagated by the Capitalists.
What exactly do you want to compare? Whether the threat of Communism was real or not? Or about US Economic history. Or whether Soviet Communism was real Communism? (it was not - real communism has NEVER existed anywhere in the world - it has been a theory that has been badly implemented by authoritarians and others).
How does "killing hope" figure into this discussion? The US was NOT fighting Communism (which never existed) - it was fighting an alternative system to Capitalism. Yes, many people will disagree with the definition of Communism - does ANYONE know how it would really work in real life? i.e. the knitty-gritty details and how the economic system would work? Not even Marx knew - he wrote 3 volumes (actually 6) on how Capitalism works (Das Kapital and Theories of Surplus Value).
>>"It's not about incentivizing stuff; it's about disincentivizing the manifestations of greed for greed's sake"
Suggestions? Examples? Incentives (and disincentives) are created (through various policies) to manifest desirable behaviors (and changes in behaviors).
Example: Increase TAX on smoking to disincentivize the behavior.
Similarly, create policies that disincentivize behaviors that lead to excess greed.
>>"Do you even know what DROVE the economic successes for the middle and upper middle classes in the US during that time period, including 1968?"
There are MULTIPLE reasons.
>>"It was the heavy government subsidization of science, manufacturing and technology SPECIFICALLY to counter the "red menace" during the Cold War"
Is that your theory/intuition? Without falling into the "correlation is causation" trap, how would you justify that line of reasoning?
At the end of WW2, the US had excess production capacity, strong manufacturing base, and a healthy and unharmed economy (unlike Europe, Soviet Union, Japan, etc.). This is when consumerism kicked into high gear and the "American Dream" was a reality (for white folk). Taxes HAD to be increased to fight inflation. That increase in taxes (including personal tax rates and high interest rates) incentivized certain behaviors.
>>"It would be easy to outlaw the most blatant manifestations of greed in the economy, healthcare and government."
Nope - not do-able. Greed has existed since humans have existed (regardless of economic or social system).
Q. How would you outlaw greed? Or happiness or sadness or love or hate or anger? These are BASIC human emotions.
These BASIC human emotions can be controlled by changing INCENTIVES (i.e. profit motive, etc.).
Here is one example: Increase corporate TAXES. The Corporate taxes in the US in 1968 reached 52.80% (https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/federal/historical-corporate-tax-rates-brackets/).
Do you know what was the resulting effect? Corporations paid MORE to employees and invested more in "research & development". They decided that instead of paying MORE to the Govt. in taxes, might as well PAY EMPLOYEES MORE and increase productivity.
These days, all the money/profits goes into STOCK BUYBACKS and artificially increasing stock prices and pay packages of "upper management", CEOs, and Board Members.
BTW, this is JUST ONE example of how incentives can work. There are many more throughout history.
>>"...the "threat" of Soviet communism..."
It was called "The Red Scare" for a reason. There was NO REAL THREAT - it was a manufactured narrative - Communists (and they were NOT Communists in reality - Stalin NEVER was) were not going to destroy and conquer the Americas. It was geopolitics, empire games, and Capitalism.
>>"at the discretion of bankers, paid employees more during a time period when - rightly or wrongly - a second or alternative system was still out there in the world"
Seriously? Is that the narrative you CHOOSE to believe? That there was REAL Communism? And that it was a REAL threat?
I suggest studying American economic history to understand the motivations behind different policies (and the resulting changes in socio-economic classes) rather than believing false narratives propagated by the Capitalists.
What exactly do you want to compare? Whether the threat of Communism was real or not? Or about US Economic history. Or whether Soviet Communism was real Communism? (it was not - real communism has NEVER existed anywhere in the world - it has been a theory that has been badly implemented by authoritarians and others).
How does "killing hope" figure into this discussion? The US was NOT fighting Communism (which never existed) - it was fighting an alternative system to Capitalism. Yes, many people will disagree with the definition of Communism - does ANYONE know how it would really work in real life? i.e. the knitty-gritty details and how the economic system would work? Not even Marx knew - he wrote 3 volumes (actually 6) on how Capitalism works (Das Kapital and Theories of Surplus Value).
>>"It's not about incentivizing stuff; it's about disincentivizing the manifestations of greed for greed's sake"
Suggestions? Examples? Incentives (and disincentives) are created (through various policies) to manifest desirable behaviors (and changes in behaviors).
Example: Increase TAX on smoking to disincentivize the behavior.
Similarly, create policies that disincentivize behaviors that lead to excess greed.
>>"Do you even know what DROVE the economic successes for the middle and upper middle classes in the US during that time period, including 1968?"
There are MULTIPLE reasons.
>>"It was the heavy government subsidization of science, manufacturing and technology SPECIFICALLY to counter the "red menace" during the Cold War"
Is that your theory/intuition? Without falling into the "correlation is causation" trap, how would you justify that line of reasoning?
At the end of WW2, the US had excess production capacity, strong manufacturing base, and a healthy and unharmed economy (unlike Europe, Soviet Union, Japan, etc.). This is when consumerism kicked into high gear and the "American Dream" was a reality (for white folk). Taxes HAD to be increased to fight inflation. That increase in taxes (including personal tax rates and high interest rates) incentivized certain behaviors.
Maybe I misunderstood what you meant? Can we try again?