alt text
A cartoon depicts a chasm with a rope bridge, once connecting both sides, cut and hanging from the side of the cliff, sabotaged by a suit standing on the well forested right side beside a spool of rope and holding a saw. The left side of the chasm is a wasteland of sawn tree stumps. There’s a sign that reads “Please return saw and rope when done”. An empty box sits beneath the sign. The suit calls out to a person in the wasteland on the left side of the chasm “BUILD YOUR OWN DAMN BRIDGE LIKE I DID!” The person in the wasteland replies “WITH WHAT?! “
Caption: Capitalism at its finest
h/t to @dgar@aus.social
A capitalist would keep the bridge and charge people for crossing.
Except when profit no longer rises by double digit percentages every year, then they cut the bridge.
And then declare bridge bankruptcy, absolving them of building a new bridge.
The bridge is not a literal toll road but a metaphor for economic mobility.
The capitalist has found opportunities to improve his his wealth and has now created conditions where others are barred from same opportunities.
That's the most efficient use of capital though. Everyone building their own bridge is stupid.
No the most efficient use is the government building the bridge because they can do it most cost efficiently when they already have to build 1000 bridges.
It also works for health care. Socialism works.
Government costs a lot of extra money, even when the scope is just building a 1000 bridges. That's not cost efficient at all.
The capitalist alternative is worse though, because the cost for using it will be higher, even if the cost for making was lower.
But that takes capital away from the government who could be spending it on healthcare...
Opportunity cost
They can do both.
Magic money tree eh?
They certainly seems to have one for military and police.
Every country does. Every country doesn't need to be building bridges constantly though, there's only so many rivers. It's inefficient.
Better to contract that out via competitive tenders to specialist bridge builders.
Infrastructure needs to be constantly maintained and rebuilt. Do you think once someone builds a bridge, it's fine and no one ever needs to replace it? Or that a river needs a new crossing somewhere else?
No, that'd be a stupid thing to think.
People who maintain bridges are not the same as those who build them though.
If your bridges constantly need rebuilding, you're not building very good bridges.
Sorry, you think two different groups of construction crews exist and one builds bridges and the other maintains bridges? And you also think that, when even small countries have hundreds of bridges, they don't need to be rebuilt on a regular basis?
Yes, one is construction, one is maintenance... These are different things...
Why do you think bridges need rebuilding? How many times has Arkadiko Bridge been rebuilt?
I see. So one bridge has never been rebuilt and that means all bridges out of hundreds or thousands of bridges in a country last forever.
Also, why would there be two different crews? You do know maintaining a bridge involves doing many of the same things you have to do when you build one, right? I don't know where you live, but that sounds like a colossal waste of money.
Lol. How many maintenance crews are pouring thousands of tons of steel reinforced concrete?
How many architects are maintaining bridges?
It's ok to admit when you're wrong you know?
Bridge maintenance requires pouring concrete all the time. Because concrete weakens over time. I know you think bridges last forever with no need to do anything but tighten a bolt here and there, but that is not how something with heavy vehicles passing over it constantly works. Roads have to be regularly repaved too. They use the same crews that lay the road down in the first place. You know that, right? You really don't understand why it would be more expensive to have two completely different crews?
Seriously, you don't know anything about construction.
Speaking of admitting you're wrong...
They are two different things you moron.
https://www.bigrentz.com/blog/how-are-bridges-built
https://bridgemastersinc.com/approaching-bridge-maintenance-efficiently
I have worked in civil engineering, maybe when you finish high school you could too!
🤦♂️
Sorry, stopped reading at the insult. I will not pay attention to anything you have to say unless you can talk to me without insulting me. If you can't, we are done here.
Sorry, but you are trying to argue that black is white. It's pointless.
You then present my argument back to me that it is expensive to have two specialised teams.
A maintenance crew does not build bridges. It would be too expensive to have architects and engineers sitting around waiting for a bridge to be built
It's an inefficient use of capital, which was my initial point... Just saying socialism fixes all problems is naive at best.
Are you going to stop insulting me? Because I don't see a reason to continue this conversation unless I know that this post isn't just the preamble to a future insult.
I'm not insulting you. You're just wrong and you don't have the capacity to admit it.
Here's an example
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Severn_Crossing
It was built by a french company that specialised in bridge building.
The maintenance was not performed by the same company
Specialisation of skills is how you utilise capital efficiency
And now you are lying. You said this:
I am not interested in talking to someone who insults me and then doesn't even have the courtesy to admit it.
Goodbye.
Do you not understand what sorry means?