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15946478 No.15946478 [Reply] [Original]

What are your thoughts on this?

>> No.15946483

Graeber is incapable of nuance
The mental gymnastics he uses to deny the early barter economies and to impinge increasingly vague concepts of debt to them is rather impressive
His constant anachronisms, not so much

>> No.15946489

>>15946483
You should instead read Mauss's books on gift and sacrifice instead
They are rather quite short, cover similar fields and are way less retarded
(2/2)

>> No.15946549

>>15946489
>>15946478
>both yids
Why is it that only jews care about money?

>> No.15946665

>>15946478
I really don't care for Graeber but you could do worse.

>>15946483
If you're going to make those claims about "early barter" you better back them up with some citations. Barter is an anomaly you find after the break down of an already monetized society or on the margins of communities not a central way of maintaining society in early history. Barter's more advanced than informal forms of reciprocal relations.

>> No.15947017

>>15946665
Barter was absolutely central to early economies you shitstain
Calling them gifts doesn't stop then from being barter

>> No.15947213

>>15946478
I'm reading it right now. I think it is interesting enough, it gets the nogging jogging. The book seems to aim to treat every aspect of debt (history) which is nice.
>>15946483
I agree with this as well. Sometimes Greaber sneaks things past you without properly arguing them. Makes you mistrust him.

>> No.15947216

>>15947017
A gift is something given with no formal legal necessity to pay anything back in return just moral suasion. Barter is when you explicitly trade one good for another. When someone gives you a gift you don't commit fraud if you don't give anything in return but the whole point is you don't want to get ostracized from all family or tribal connections.

Barter doesn't create "debt" in any sense, if you exchange a bow for a fishing net there's no new obligations created in the process. I'm not going to get into what exactly "debt" is philosophically but gifting is closer than barter obviously. Exchange between strangers over long distance wasn't central to primitive economies. Using post-contact aboriginal societies as analogies to how early homo sapiens lived is naive.

Graeber is right that mainstream economics is obsessed with simplified fictitious barter models instead of understanding real monetized liability structures but he oversimplifies in some ways... and anarchists who promote a "gift economy" type arrangement are stupid since that sort of psychological pressure to conform ain't desirable.

>> No.15947245

>>15946478
inb4 Cato Institute
https://www.alt-m.org/2016/03/15/myth-myth-barter/
https://www.alt-m.org/2016/03/24/graeber-once-more/

>> No.15947378

>>15947213
>The book seems to aim to treat every aspect of debt (history) which is nice.
I read it around when it came out so I kind of forget but I don't think he treats "debt" broad enough actually.

>>15947245
Ya this is probably an Austrotard, just skimming this:
>One can incur a debt by borrowing some non-monetary good or goods, just as well as by borrowing money, where repayment is also to be made in goods, and is no less precisely quantified than a monetary obligation might be.
How much loaning of goods in a non-monetized economy would you expect? Not much. Money was revolutionary and double-entry book keeping was even more so.
All modern economies are about accumulating an infinite amount of IOUs not really exchanging goods and services. It's not even really primarily about "scarcity" but making people have faith in your income tomorrow. Teslas stock is valuable because "investors" think they'll make a lot of money... some time in the future. Marginalists don't like to think to much like that because capitalization might not have much to do with real serviceability or output but just manipulating perceptions or even generating a return by pure acts of sabotage.

>> No.15947780

Is he connected to MMT in any way?

>> No.15947792
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15947792

>>15946478
recomend pairing it with this bad boy

>> No.15947824

>>15947792
>Book argues that a good strategy for avoiding taxes is to be illiterate so there are no records of anything

anarchism is so dumb

>> No.15948027

>>15947378
Please provide evidence for your retarded claims

>> No.15948304

>>15947017
if barter was absolutely essential to early economies how come no premodern peoples have ever been discovered operating under a pure barter system

>> No.15948441

>>15947780
His writing is kinda chartalistic but I don't think he "gets" MMT since he talks in fairly conventional ways about interest rates and such. He's got a review of a book in the new york review of books (pay-walled) which goes into some contemporary economics

https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2019/12/05/against-economics/


>>15948027
I don't know what claim you mean? If you mean on monetization I think that's self-evident enough since you just have to compare the real results. Debt markets didn't develop out of barter relations. Crypto is a good modern example, people aren't taking out crypto loans and it's exchanging hands in kind. You're probably buying crypto not taking out a loan denominated in crypto. That can only go so far and can freeze up. That's why I don't think crypto is serious money and the libertarian notion of modern economic structures developing out of voluntary relations is flawed. The modern economy originates in coercion and has to be imposed and managed. The debt burden on individuals can't go to far without making everyone slaves and hurting growth but without anyone owing anyone else anything you'll get similar issues.
If you mean the nature of economic activity well people don't exactly have any diminishing utility when it comes to money or other such forms of intangible wealth and the main aim of the social elite is to get rich. Look at the mega rich, they have a massive net worth and aren't trying to convert it all into real goods and are happy enough to see their net worth keep going up on paper. If you're going to be rich others need to believe you're rich.


>>15948304
That's not a good argument because there's no real "premodern" people.

>> No.15948513

>>15948441
>currently there are no historical peoples alive

>> No.15948580

>>15948513
Well not really. There's no society not influenced by contact with more advanced ones at some point but you've really got to hand it to hardcore LARPers like the Tasaday

>> No.15948653

>>15948580
>because there are no HISTORICAL people alive we cannot study their HISTORY

>> No.15948689

>>15948653
Anthropology is quite different from making analogies about the past based on some African tribe living today or whatever.

>> No.15948936

>>15946478
just read bullshit jobs its much better. utopia of rules is good too