
Monopoly was invented to demonstrate the evils of capitalism - kawera
http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20170728-monopoly-was-invented-to-demonstrate-the-evils-of-capitalism
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Overtonwindow
This is a duplicate of a previous, very, very lengthy discussion.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14819622](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14819622)

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WalterBright
Monopoly is set up as a zero-sum game, hence it is not representative of
capitalism at all. Free markets are not zero sum.

That's easily shown. Give me $20 of art materials, and I will turn out
something I have to pay someone to haul away. Give it to Picasso, and he'll
turn it into a million dollar creation.

In fact, the entire software industry is based on creating value out of
nothing.

~~~
manicdee
Monopoly is set up as a zero sum game, exactly like actual capitalism is.

If we give you $20 if art materials, we can't give Picasso those materials
because you already have them.

The world is finite. Resources are finite, and infinite expansion is
impossible.

~~~
adventured
> The world is finite. Resources are finite, and infinite expansion is
> impossible.

If you were right, the $10 trillion China added to its economy annually (you
know, just ~$64 trillion of new GDP that didn't exist before, over the next
five years) - in just the span of ~16 years, would have had to come out of
someone else's pocket, which would have caused extreme collapse in numerous
other major economies to make room for it. That of course didn't happen at
all, the rest of the globe's GDP expanded along with China in real terms.

For all realistic practical purposes - since we're nowhere near maximum
resource utilization - that has yet to be an actual problem and we're up to
7.x billion people now. Every serious problem to that expansion, we've managed
to solve, enabling continued expansion (see: we were all supposed to starve to
death decades ago).

Back in reality - and out of the realm of theory that only exists in a strict
vacuum - Capitalism is the exact opposite of a zero sum game. That has been
proven by the radical improvement in living standards at the median for all
the developed nations, all of which heavily utilize the free market economic
system (including all of the Scandinavian nations, none of which are actually
Socialist at all).

If Capitalism were a zero sum game, China would not have just enjoyed the
greatest, fastest mass standard of living improvement in world history thanks
to its modest adoption of the free market, and its blatant shift away from
Statism.

The free market largely won globally, and thanks to that, the world has less
poverty, war, violence and starvation than at any other time in history.

~~~
c22
> the world has less poverty, war, violence and starvation than at any other
> time in history.

Is this true, though? Certainly as a percentage of global population things
like poverty and hunger are in decline but some of this can be attributed to
population increases. There were 795 million hungry people in 2015 [1], but
this is more people than were alive in 1750. It stands to reason that 300
years ago there were considerably fewer individuals living on the brink of
starvation.

[1]
[http://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2015/06/01/41126502...](http://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2015/06/01/411265021/there-
are-200-million-fewer-hungry-people-than-25-years-ago)

~~~
taurath
In raw numbers, but the rate is what's important.

~~~
c22
Why?

~~~
taurath
If 5 billion people are on the planet and 10% are in poverty, its probably
better to be that 10% (trending downward) than it would be if you had 1
billion people at 40% poverty (trending flat).

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bmiranda
I think this article misses the point of Georgism: that the land tax replaces
all other taxes.

In other words, while land belongs to the government (people), individuals are
entitled to the entire product of their labor (as well as returns on capital).
Georgism is simultaneously extremely Communistic and Capitalistic.

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grecy
Has anyone here actually played Monopoly as an adult?

My memories from childhood are of it being quite fun, and slow.

While managing a hostel a few years ago I played hundreds of games with
hundreds of adults - with adults it's extremely cut-throat and downright
nasty. I estimate 75% of games ended with people yelling and screaming, after
less than 4 times around the board.

It's amazing to watch how nasty it gets, and how everyone takes it so
personally.

~~~
flomo
My memories of playing it as a child is kids crying and whining. I think this
game is designed so nobody really wins, they just slowly bleed the losers
until they have a breakdown and quit.

Playing it as an adult, it was mostly an excuse to drink, and people had the
sense to quit before the breakdown part.

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macleod2486
What she didn't realize what she ended up demonstrating was the reality of
pareto distributions.

Dr. Jordan Peterson does a good detailing of this phenomenon.

[https://youtu.be/TcEWRykSgwE](https://youtu.be/TcEWRykSgwE)

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adrianratnapala
Whatever the alleged reason, Monopoly looks to me like it was invented as a
fun game rather than a allegory for anything at all. It does seem to be trying
to resemble actual economic activity at all.

For example the Banker is not only a kind of public service, but is performing
a service only vaguely related to what banks do. And in what world do you need
to own a whole neighbourhood before you can put a hotel anywhere?

Now Bohnanza
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bohnanza](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bohnanza))
has some resemblance to real capitalism, but is also too much fun to a lesson
in anything.

~~~
wsc981

        Whatever the alleged reason, Monopoly looks 
        to me like it was invented as a fun game ...
    

I'd call Monopoly a lot, but a "fun game" it is not. It's a hugely frustrating
game and I'd be happy to never play it again for the rest of my life.

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joshuahhh
I am delighted to have the chance to learn what the Hacker News community
thinks about capitalism.

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mattbgates
"You don't win... you just do a little better each time." \- Cleveland, Family
Guy ( [https://youtu.be/liRioOpF5sw](https://youtu.be/liRioOpF5sw) )

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andrewstuart
I would have paid more attention to Monopoly if I had known life would
actually play out in precisely the same way.

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illuminati1911
If she wanted to demonstrate "the evils of capitalism" it's pretty ironic that
she decided to name the game with problem that can only exist in non-
capitalist systems and is the flagship product of communism/socialism.

