The First World War

Note the quotes.

Globalization isn't an economic policy, or system, it's a phenomena. Capitalism is the system that drives and has driven our economy, and the economies of the world.

Btw, love your sig Shaw.

I want everybody to put a tribute to Toast in their sig. He was a great man.

No.
I will save the discussion of why for the offiicial thread that has already been posted, but beyond the official reasons, my sig is already too full.

I commend you my good man, you have spoilers within spoilers. *claps*

It really has just become something of a glorified 'Remember this' list, really.
You should read it sometimes.

I will tomorrow probably. I would not but I got bed in 12 minutes.

KK.

No, the Germans actually had a very good reason not to invade the Netherlands. We have the port of Rotterdam, which was (and is) the most important port for Germany. By keeping us neutral, we could trade with the whole world. The germans could then buy whatever they wanted from us, an officially ''neutral'' power. We were basically Germany's black market. Invading us would ruin Germany, and the Germans knew it.

Of course, the Dutch being awesome may also had something to do with it.

I saw them. But if they call themselves socialist, even if they aren't true socialism, they still won't do well with capitalism.

We shape our modern economics on globalization. It doesn't matter that its just a phenomena because without it we would, well I'm not quite sure what we would do without globalization.

I agree with this.

If economists call him the father of modern economics and capitalism, then I would find it pretty hard to argue with economists.

No. Economists call him that because that's the way it seems to him. But they do not hold the same values as him.

I never said they hold the same values as him. I am saying that most economists agree that he was and is the father of modern economics.

Mosh, you're barred from using the term globalization. Globalization is a phenomenon that higher academia struggles to define or study. Its scope and meaning still elude experts, and it's yet to be seen if globalization truly exists. At the level you're using it, it's nothing more than a generic, hollow buzzword. And even at that elementary level, it's not antagonistic towards capitalism. One of the key premises behind globalization is decline of the state as the primary international agent, and the rise of the transnational corporation (and NGOs in general, for that matter). Globalization is a force that theoretically puts capitalism above the state, not the other way around.

The basic fundamentals of the market, as laid out by Adam Smith, then become significantly more important than they are in the status quo. And considering that the entire discipline of economics is governed by those principles, that's pretty damned important.

I didn't mean globalization in that sense, I simply used it for lack of a better word. What I meant was that today's nations rely upon each other for goods and material. Obviously I was using the word loosely, and definitly not to mean the phenmena you are describing. For the record, globalzation has a clear definition and is a theory.

I don't think you quite understand what we're talking about. Economics =/= trade.

What you're describing is trade, which has happened since the dawn of time. The Romans for example traded with everyone they knew, going as far as India. They however knew nothing about economics. The same thing applies to the triangle trade you're talking about. That trade route wasn't special in any way. Those traders didn't know the first thing about economics. Yes, you had a thing called mercantilism, but that focused only on trade and it was extremely flawed. Basic economic theory wasn't invented yet until Adam Smith was around.

Adam Smith was an economist, he basically invented economics as an actual field of study. Classical economics, that is. That's what we call it now, and for a long time, that was the only kind of economic theory. Every other economic theory is either based upon this or it's derived from it in some way. In other words, he's kind of a big deal. He is the father of economics. If you don't know who he is, then you don't know anything about economics. There's nothing wrong with that, but don't argue that he's not important. As I said before, it's like saying Isaac Newton wasn't a big deal for physics.

I never said he wasn't a big deal. But not knowing about him does not make me completely uninformed about economics. It just means I didn't quite understand capitalist theory. I'm reading it right now (The Wealth of Nations) and it sounds a bit greedy to me. In any case, why do we continue arguing this point when its over now? Now that I know who he is, that means I am educated in economics automatically right?

Sounds a bit greedy? Remember, when he was writing this, everything made went to the monarchies.

So? That doesn't mean everything made should go to the person in the best situation to get it. And you shouldn't be talking, you haven't read the book