Why can't capitalism be more democractic?

Question

then the prices would fall(except for mid-eastern oil) and the mim. wage would go up. right?

Answer 1

Capitalism is Democratic. Everybody with $1.00 has 1/Vote.  The Market "votes" with its money and prices and wages adjust accordingly.

If Oil is unaffordable, everybody will vote with their money not to buy it. As such, inventories will build, prices will drop, and people will again vote that oil is affordable and begin purchasing it.

Let Free Markets Work. Attempting to control the economy by Government Decree only leads to shortages, high prices, and a non-functioning economy.

Answer 2

Prices in capitalism are determined by how much people want goods given their budget.  Every attempt to control prices has failed miserably.  Remember the decade of gasoline lines in the 1970's.  It became so bad under Nixon's price controls that farmers were drowning their chicken's en masse.  Prices would not fall.

The minimum wage causes poverty and makes it much worse.  Instead of allowing people to freely contract for work, it creates a surplus labor pool lowering everyone's wages.  Some workers have work skills so poor they cannot produce enough product to earn the minimum wage so they remain forever unemployed.  They would work for lower wages, but the government won't let them.  If minimum wages worked, then just set the minimum wage to a million dollars an hour and everyone would be rich.   All the research on the effects of minimum wages have been horribly negative.  It does not appear there are any positive effects.

Answer 3

Capitalism cannot be more democratic because the two ideas are diametrically opposed.  Democracy is the idea that one man gets one vote and capitalism is the idea that one dollar gets one vote.  The man with the most dollars has the most influence and this is the system that is prevalent in America today.  To think that capitalism leads to democracy is at best naive and at worst intentionally misleading.

Answer 4

Because capitalism is an economic model, while democracy is a political model.  They are completely different ideas.  

Besides, the fundamental idea of capitalism is to reward the person who takes a risk and succeeds.  If you start a business that fulfills a need in your market, you deserve to be rewarded.  You put your time, energy, capital, and talent at risk to do so.  If you chose correctly, your rewards will be money and status in the market.  What you are saying is that people who didn't take the risk should get the reward.

Answer 5

I don't follow your logic.

Answer 6

Capitalism is utterly democratic. EVERYONE gets to vote with their dollars, euros, yen.

Answer 7

Pure capitalism would be completely democratic - everything decided by all of the individuals that make up the market.

Instead, with so much government regulation, we don't have pure capitalism.

Without any government regulation, you wouldn't have any minimum wage.

With government regulation, prices are higher due to business costs of paying the extra taxes to pay the people to make new regulations and the costs to comply.

Answer 8

Capitalism is an economic system. Democracy is a political one. As such you are comparing apple to oranges.

However,  everyone is allowed to compete in the market so exactly how would you make it more democractic?  We have anti-trust laws and anti-monopoly laws (which are inherently anti-capitalist but pro democratic).