This is not a SFW instance. NSFW communities will be tagged, and efforts will be made to keep SFW communities clean, but proceed at your own comfort level.
Some wealthy countries withhold medical treatment from their own Citizens, no matter how much they need it. 8 years old and need a kidney transplant? Kidney is ready to go, but if a parent doesn’t have health insurance, the kidney goes to the rich guy, and the poor kid dies.
I wonder which country would do that? Surely not the richest, most powerful nation on the planet.
We are still the richest, and most powerful, nation in the planet. Those things don’t benefit the vast majority of Citizens, but it is still very true.
That’s what I’m getting at though: it’s a question of semantics.
The US is presently the richest by GDP (although not for long given historic trajectories), but if you measure by purchasing power China overtook the US in 2014:
Nominal GDP measures economic output at current market exchange rates. By this measure, the U.S. is clearly ahead — its $28.8 trillion economy is about 62% larger than China’s $17.8 trillion.
Purchasing power parity (PPP) GDP adjusts for differences in domestic price levels — a haircut in Shanghai costs far less than a haircut in San Francisco, even though both deliver the same service. PPP attempts to capture the real volume of goods and services an economy produces, not just their dollar value at exchange rates. On this PPP-adjusted basis, China overtook the U.S. around 2014 and is now ~22% larger.
Similarly if you count military might by the number of planes and soldiers then the US has the largest and most expensive military. However, given the already over-stressed bonds market, does the US really have the capability to flex that military might in a drawn out conflict?
There was immense soft power in the past, but Trump has really burned through that. He hasn’t been able to overcome resistance from much smaller neighboring economies.
The US is still a global super power but a mere shadow of it’s former self.
It’s not that simple. Corporations (including those producing and distributing drugs) are interested in spreading on as much markets as possible. In many poor countries it’s more convenient for dictators to slow down or completely stop progress to subdue poor masses (only loyal heads from army, militia, intelligence and their families get all most modern medical treatment, while others can even starve or shit to death for example). Moreover, in many cases, spread on other markets not really depends on regime types much. Usually it’s enough for regime to just give a permission to certain corp to sell on it’s territory’s market, so corp just fills it with it’s products at regular or region-specific prices (usually lower than in developed countries). So it may be a totalitarian regime, even waging occupative war, but with almost all the goodies (all the essential ones and almost all fancy unnecessary ones) etc., simply because drugs and cosmetics aren’t parts for shahed drones for example. Tho if you’ll grow big in such market, dicktator will just throw you (franchise owner, or official representative of some corp) out of the window and replace you with some loyal puppet to just cut the buzz (even if they suck as managers and whole business will eventually die — they are more interested in quick money, not long lasting investment plans with sophisticated profit calculations). And loyal members are assured that it’s the only way of existence and generally one step aside from party’s line and your dead, so they are just calmly nod their heads to all the bullshit and oppression. Profit on the first place, even for so called “communists”.
It’s an extreme (ultra?) radicalised inhumane form of capitalism, progress and welfare are completely forgotten at this point and it’s no longer an adequate capitalism or not capitalism at all.
imo…
Corporates are our gods we love them, i live in a denial bubble, poor children being cut out of modern medicine is not our concern because its CoMpLeX because dictators because yada yada yada yada….
Man its just neoliberal crap, just saving everyone’s time.
Isn’t the movie kind of a metaphor about wealthy vs poor countries?
Yes heal everything machines do not exist, but wealthy countries certainly withhold medical treatment from others.
Some wealthy countries withhold medical treatment from their own Citizens, no matter how much they need it. 8 years old and need a kidney transplant? Kidney is ready to go, but if a parent doesn’t have health insurance, the kidney goes to the rich guy, and the poor kid dies.
I wonder which country would do that? Surely not the richest, most powerful nation on the planet.
There’s no war but the class war.
I say, I say!
THERE IS NO WAR BUT CLASS WAR!
So… this doesn’t really appear to be true any more. Not in any meaningful way at least.
The US might have the largest GDP, but eye-watering debt levels and diminishing quality of life.
We are still the richest, and most powerful, nation in the planet. Those things don’t benefit the vast majority of Citizens, but it is still very true.
That’s what I’m getting at though: it’s a question of semantics.
The US is presently the richest by GDP (although not for long given historic trajectories), but if you measure by purchasing power China overtook the US in 2014:
https://statspanda.com/blog/usa-vs-china-gdp-2026
Similarly if you count military might by the number of planes and soldiers then the US has the largest and most expensive military. However, given the already over-stressed bonds market, does the US really have the capability to flex that military might in a drawn out conflict?
There was immense soft power in the past, but Trump has really burned through that. He hasn’t been able to overcome resistance from much smaller neighboring economies.
The US is still a global super power but a mere shadow of it’s former self.
Valid
The entire cyberpunk genre is a metaphor about wealthy vs poor.
Also a metaphor for if the Japanese economy overtook America it would be the worst timeline
It’s not that simple. Corporations (including those producing and distributing drugs) are interested in spreading on as much markets as possible. In many poor countries it’s more convenient for dictators to slow down or completely stop progress to subdue poor masses (only loyal heads from army, militia, intelligence and their families get all most modern medical treatment, while others can even starve or shit to death for example). Moreover, in many cases, spread on other markets not really depends on regime types much. Usually it’s enough for regime to just give a permission to certain corp to sell on it’s territory’s market, so corp just fills it with it’s products at regular or region-specific prices (usually lower than in developed countries). So it may be a totalitarian regime, even waging occupative war, but with almost all the goodies (all the essential ones and almost all fancy unnecessary ones) etc., simply because drugs and cosmetics aren’t parts for shahed drones for example. Tho if you’ll grow big in such market, dicktator will just throw you (franchise owner, or official representative of some corp) out of the window and replace you with some loyal puppet to just cut the buzz (even if they suck as managers and whole business will eventually die — they are more interested in quick money, not long lasting investment plans with sophisticated profit calculations). And loyal members are assured that it’s the only way of existence and generally one step aside from party’s line and your dead, so they are just calmly nod their heads to all the bullshit and oppression. Profit on the first place, even for so called “communists”. It’s an extreme (ultra?) radicalised inhumane form of capitalism, progress and welfare are completely forgotten at this point and it’s no longer an adequate capitalism or not capitalism at all. imo…
I might have read this if it wasn’t a single monolithic paragraph spanning 31 lines on a phone
Man its just neoliberal crap, just saving everyone’s time.