As Germany’s defence stocks go ballistic, armsmakers are tooling up
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I hope some people will finally realize who really profits from all the increased defense spending. Because the people of Ukraine will not be it.
So what's your alternative? Do nothing as Russia invades country after country and hope that they'll stop before it's our turn?
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So what's your alternative? Do nothing as Russia invades country after country and hope that they'll stop before it's our turn?
If people were as serious about it as they pretend to be, we would be talking about nationalizing those defense industries.
You know who the biggest shareholders of Rheinmetall are? US American investment fonds linked to fascists. And the original founders of all these German companies? Yeah, litteral Nazis.
They are of course happy to sell to both sides. They always do.
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And look where this kind of thinking got us: Ecological collapse and the climate catastrophe. Have fun eating money I guess
Your kind of naive and emotionalized thinking will get you nowhere. Nowhere!
Sacrifice of prosperity for the good of mankind, as you're suggesting it, has never worked. A society is only content when they can feel a constant upwind in their quality of life. See China for example: people are comparatively happy there despite the authoritarian government because they can feel growth and growing prosperity in their everyday lives like they have never felt before. If you don't have that, you get social unrest, radicalization and eventually wars. You're seing the infancy of that already in Europe and the US.
There is a very easy way to fix the climate: make it profitable. Guide the economy in a direction such that eventually they don't need subsidies for climate-friendly production. This is the only way. But for it to work, you need to have a plan! This is very important. A plan to make climate protection profitable. Else, it will NEVER work.
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And look where this kind of thinking got us: Ecological collapse and the climate catastrophe. Have fun eating money I guess
Even a socialist command economy has to reason in terms of inputs and outputs. The difference in value between the two is a pretty good indicator of whether the given economic activity is successful or not. In a capitalist system the positive difference is called profits and the capitalists get to keep it. That fact doesn't discredit the entire concept of "profits" as a net gain in value.
Anyway, just because the capitalists may win most (the whole system is called capitalism after all), doesn't mean that ramping up European arms production isn't a huge benefit for Ukraine.
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If people were as serious about it as they pretend to be, we would be talking about nationalizing those defense industries.
You know who the biggest shareholders of Rheinmetall are? US American investment fonds linked to fascists. And the original founders of all these German companies? Yeah, litteral Nazis.
They are of course happy to sell to both sides. They always do.
The founders argument is misleading, though I find no fault in the rest of your sentiment. Still, the perfect is the enemy of the good. If they issue Eurobonds I'm buying them whether it's going to deepen liberalist hold over the west or not, and the one thing I think we can count on is that they won't sell to Russia or the United States.
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Even a socialist command economy has to reason in terms of inputs and outputs. The difference in value between the two is a pretty good indicator of whether the given economic activity is successful or not. In a capitalist system the positive difference is called profits and the capitalists get to keep it. That fact doesn't discredit the entire concept of "profits" as a net gain in value.
Anyway, just because the capitalists may win most (the whole system is called capitalism after all), doesn't mean that ramping up European arms production isn't a huge benefit for Ukraine.
I said nothing about socialist command economy
Try reading up about "capitalist realism" and you might realize that there are a lot of other options than capitalism or socialist dictatorship. Anyone who argues in binaries like that is either extremely naive or has a capitalist agenda.
And no. The benefit to Ukraine is indirect at best. Notice how the pundits like to always say "but Ukraine" but how there is a suspivious absense of concrete plans on how this increased defense spending is directly benefitting Ukraine?
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If people were as serious about it as they pretend to be, we would be talking about nationalizing those defense industries.
You know who the biggest shareholders of Rheinmetall are? US American investment fonds linked to fascists. And the original founders of all these German companies? Yeah, litteral Nazis.
They are of course happy to sell to both sides. They always do.
Ok, but what is your proposed solution to the current problem? Problem being aggressive Russia, isolationist (and possibly aggressive in the future) USA.
Start the nationalization process and if someone attacks, we will shout "give me 10 more years, I'm almost done restructuring"?
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Your kind of naive and emotionalized thinking will get you nowhere. Nowhere!
Sacrifice of prosperity for the good of mankind, as you're suggesting it, has never worked. A society is only content when they can feel a constant upwind in their quality of life. See China for example: people are comparatively happy there despite the authoritarian government because they can feel growth and growing prosperity in their everyday lives like they have never felt before. If you don't have that, you get social unrest, radicalization and eventually wars. You're seing the infancy of that already in Europe and the US.
There is a very easy way to fix the climate: make it profitable. Guide the economy in a direction such that eventually they don't need subsidies for climate-friendly production. This is the only way. But for it to work, you need to have a plan! This is very important. A plan to make climate protection profitable. Else, it will NEVER work.
Yeah keep sticking your fingers in your ears and pretend everything is fine
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If people were as serious about it as they pretend to be, we would be talking about nationalizing those defense industries.
You know who the biggest shareholders of Rheinmetall are? US American investment fonds linked to fascists. And the original founders of all these German companies? Yeah, litteral Nazis.
They are of course happy to sell to both sides. They always do.
Even during the World Wars the defence industry wasn't wholly nationalised.
37% of Rheinmetall's shares are owned by NA investors, none individually control more than 6%. And no, Rheinmetall wasn't founded by Nazis. It predates the Nazis by decades, the company was founded in the same year Hitler was born in. And even if it was, why would that matter today? The company is not owned by the people who founded it. It's not even owned by their descendants (who still would not be the same people).
They are also NOT selling to both sides. I'm not even disputing that they wouldn't, they might well want to, but they literally can't. They're not allowed to and that is enforced.
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The founders argument is misleading, though I find no fault in the rest of your sentiment. Still, the perfect is the enemy of the good. If they issue Eurobonds I'm buying them whether it's going to deepen liberalist hold over the west or not, and the one thing I think we can count on is that they won't sell to Russia or the United States.
Some of these companies are still family owned, but yes I consider the other point to be more important. There are loads of war profiteers, and while Rheinmetall itself is unlikely to sell weapons to Russia or the US, I assume their owners have little reason not to and also own other companies that will.
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Ok, but what is your proposed solution to the current problem? Problem being aggressive Russia, isolationist (and possibly aggressive in the future) USA.
Start the nationalization process and if someone attacks, we will shout "give me 10 more years, I'm almost done restructuring"?
How is the ownership structure of an already existing company relevant to it's capability to produce the outputs necessary? If anything they will be more able to produce the needed things if a large part of the money isn't siphoned off to US American investment fonds.
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Some of these companies are still family owned, but yes I consider the other point to be more important. There are loads of war profiteers, and while Rheinmetall itself is unlikely to sell weapons to Russia or the US, I assume their owners have little reason not to and also own other companies that will.
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Even during the World Wars the defence industry wasn't wholly nationalised.
37% of Rheinmetall's shares are owned by NA investors, none individually control more than 6%. And no, Rheinmetall wasn't founded by Nazis. It predates the Nazis by decades, the company was founded in the same year Hitler was born in. And even if it was, why would that matter today? The company is not owned by the people who founded it. It's not even owned by their descendants (who still would not be the same people).
They are also NOT selling to both sides. I'm not even disputing that they wouldn't, they might well want to, but they literally can't. They're not allowed to and that is enforced.
Ah, because Nazis in Germany magically appeared with Hitlers birth and all magically disappeared when he committed suicide?
As I already said elsewhere, Rheinmetall itself might not sell, but the profits go to people that can invest them into other businesses that can sell and/or otherwise support fascists regimes around the world.
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If people were as serious about it as they pretend to be, we would be talking about nationalizing those defense industries.
You know who the biggest shareholders of Rheinmetall are? US American investment fonds linked to fascists. And the original founders of all these German companies? Yeah, litteral Nazis.
They are of course happy to sell to both sides. They always do.
I'm fairly certain any company deciding to supply arms to both their country and its enemy would immediately be charged with treason
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So do you propose you and I start an arms cooperative this afternoon? I don't exactly disapprove, it's what I might have done in the 50s, yet we're out of time.
No, I am saying if people truely believed that we are in a situation of existential risk, then the German government would be talking about nationalizing existing companies like Rheinmetall.
That they are not talking about that at all, tells us a lot about their true motivations.
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How is the ownership structure of an already existing company relevant to it's capability to produce the outputs necessary? If anything they will be more able to produce the needed things if a large part of the money isn't siphoned off to US American investment fonds.
On what grounds? Are you suggesting a soviet style government takeover of existing business? If you would like to do it in the "civilized way" you would have to buy that business and while it might be profitable in a very long run it would cost you much more now just (and state owned companies tend to get less efficient).
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I'm fairly certain any company deciding to supply arms to both their country and its enemy would immediately be charged with treason
Sure for individual companies, but what about their owners?
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No, I am saying if people truely believed that we are in a situation of existential risk, then the German government would be talking about nationalizing existing companies like Rheinmetall.
That they are not talking about that at all, tells us a lot about their true motivations.
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Sure for individual companies, but what about their owners?
Bet most governments would question where the owner got the bazooka from if it's not coming from the company
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On what grounds? Are you suggesting a soviet style government takeover of existing business? If you would like to do it in the "civilized way" you would have to buy that business and while it might be profitable in a very long run it would cost you much more now just (and state owned companies tend to get less efficient).
The German constitution allows this kind of nationalization in times of crisis.
My suggestion would be to refund these speculators the (inflation adjusted) pre-war value of the stock. That's currently less than a tenth of the current stock price, to give you an idea how much they have already profitted.
And it is a bit funny to argue state owned companies are less efficient and the same time fear-monger about the Russian war economy that is now fully state controlled. But yes, in times of peace when companies can freely chose what to produce, non-state owned companies tend to be more efficient.
