Do you think banks should exist?
Sure, central national banks that are publicly owned should exist.
But not private loaning? Should the government charge interest on their investment?
Probably, because interest is a tool to get the loan paid back. The interest shouldn’t be used to make someone rich though. It should be used for the public good.
That’s right, I think private loaning and capital should be illegal. Every business could be run as a cooperative owned by the workers, and the central bank could play the role of VCs by giving the initial capital to people who wish to start a cooperative business.
Governments have historically been incredibly conservative about what forms of business they support. To achieve the same innovation in new sectors like tech, the government would need to be much much more risky in who it gives loans to. They’d need to provide the utility of discerning good investments from bad ones that the public sector currently provides. And they’d need to be really good at it, since efficient allocation of capital is uber important to producing what needs to be produced.
There is absolutely no reason why private investors are better at discerning good investments from bad ones. In fact, empirical evidence shows that they’re objectively terrible at it. the other problem is of course that private investors invest in ventures with the primary purpose of creating profit with any other considerations being secondary. This means that many of these investments result in things that are harmful to society, but are profitable for investors. The opiod epidemic in US is a good example of this dynamic. Government investments are far more likely to result in ventures that produce positive social value.
The idea that private investment is necessary for innovation is also a fallacy. USSR pioneered a lot of technologies and it had no private business or investing. Likewise in the west, most fundamental research is done on public funding and then given away to companies to commercialize.
In fact, empirical evidence shows that they’re objectively terrible at it
That sounds like it’s taking about hedge funds and profile managers, not investors/bankers in general.
it gives some examples of hedge fund and profile managers, but the point it makes is very much a general one.
This means that many of these investments result in things that are harmful to society, but are profitable for investors.
That’s why you need to internalize the externalized costs with taxes and regulation.
USSR pioneered a lot of technologies and it had no private business or investing.
I should have clarified, the application of new technologies and innovations is better in free market systems. The USSR invented the cell phone for example, but it couldn’t be widely spread because the bureaucracy underestimated the benefit.
That’s why you need to internalize the externalized costs with taxes and regulation.
We have over a century of evidence that you can’t because the government fundamentally represents the interests of the class that holds power. In a capitalist society it’s the capital owning class because wealth directly translates into influence.
I should have clarified, the application of new technologies and innovations is better in free market systems. The USSR invented the cell phone for example, but it couldn’t be widely spread because the bureaucracy underestimated the benefit.
Markets aren’t in any way at odds with what I’m suggesting though. Markets are perfectly compatible with a socialist system.
What about Credit Unions? They’re cooperatives owned by the members. Despite not having a handful of shareholders collecting profits, they’re usually not that much different than dealing with a bank. Services and rates are usually pretty comparable.
I think credit unions are fine, and I’d treat them as a form of public ownership since they are cooperatively owned.
You again! Do you post more tame content on lemmy.ml and keep the bonkers on lemmygrad? If so, that’s appreciated.
If by tame you mean content that doesn’t make libs here foam at the mouth then sure.
Here’s a secret I wish someone had told me:
Start a company. It’s really not that hard, and even if you fail, you will be seen as more valuable than you were before you started the company.
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Come up with a good idea. There are a million of them.
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Read books on startups.
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Learn to pitch investors. Investors actually want ideas from young people because they know that sometimes they have a better idea of the zeitgeist. They also will help you because they were once young and want to pass on the help. Really.
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Build your company.
Again, you may fail, but even if you do you will now be the CEO/founder of a company, which is worth way more than an average grad. You will learn a ton in the process and make a lot of useful connections.
Seriously - best career advice out there.
You’d also need a lot of your own money and time to invest to get a proof of concept to present. Plus, something like 90% of startups fail, so you’re probably going to be out a load of money and time.
You can do it on your evenings and weekends. I realize people think I’m being elitist, but that was the point of my post - way more people could do it than think they can.
And failure is not the huge disaster in startups that people think. Even successful entrepreneurs have failures. Also, even running a failed startup elevates you to management if you go work at a big company.
You think people don’t work weekends? Anyway, that doesn’t solve the money problem. And you’ll need a lot of information, a college degree would definitely help, especially to give credibility to investors. Which takes even more time people don’t have.
My friend is running a startup pretty much exactly like you’re saying. But it’s taking him 2 or 3 years of full time work just to get full go ahead. He has enough savings to do that, and parents house to live in. Plus lots of connections from college. And even him I’m not confident won’t go bankrupt. But most people aren’t in such a privileged position that they can just decide to not work for several years to start a startup.
I think you forgot a few steps such as have connections with rich investors, and having the time to devote to developing your idea into a business. If you’re born poor, then statistically speaking you’re never going to get the opportunity to even try to start a business because you’re going to be too busy making sure you have food to eat and you can put a roof over your head. In US, your zip code is a good predictor of your success because early opportunities play a big role. Rich kids get far more of them than poor ones.
My point is that rich kids get funded partly because they are rich and have connections, but also because people tell them they can do it.
Almost all investors will accept emails with pitches. You can build a pitch on nights and weekends while holding down a full time job.
I am just trying to encourage people to realize it’s more possible than they think because I wish people had told me that.
Cold calling investors with a pitch is about as likely to get you funding as buying a lottery ticket. Sure, once in a while somebody will get lucky, but it’s an astronomically unlikely scenario. The reality is that investors are highly unlikely to throw money at an idea from a person they’ve never met before who just randomly sent them an email with a pitch. They’re much more likely to get a return investing in a business from somebody they know and have confidence in. You’re far better off making a Kickstarter campaign for your idea than trying to pitch to an investor.
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