Bill Gates, Charlie Munger, Warren Buffett on the socialism versus capitalism debate

Gentlemen, we've talked a lot on our air recently about

socialism

versus

capitalism

, defending

capitalism

, all the different political pressures that are building as we head into another election year, and I thought maybe we could talk about that this morning. Several questions arose over the weekend about Warren's defense of capitalism. You came out and said you're a card-carrying member, a card-carrying capitalist, in front of everyone, what do you think about the attacks we've seen? To this point about capitalism, well, I guess I don't think people know exactly what they're talking about. It's not capitalism, it's perfect, but if you look at what was here in 1776 and what is now in this country.

It is an incredible job in terms of the deployment of resources and human ingenuity and that is the product of a system and that now means that each decision must be made simply according to the determinants of the open market, that obviously there is a need for regulation and there are things that have costs to long term and they may not be incorporated, but the idea of ​​people unleashing their potential using the resources they have to create what we have now from what was here 240 years ago is absolutely a miracle and what the three of us have seen in our lifetime and if we compare it to any centrally planned economy, you know, I think we won hands down and I think we're just getting started with what capitalism could produce in the United States, but I think it obviously needs its rules and regulations, well, you did an interview in Davos with someone and you made a pretty innocuous statement, you looked around, you thought capitalism was the best system and you got attacked online by all these people who made up these crazy statements.

How can you say things like that? I mean, what do you think about the weather when you see things like that? Well, some people think that when you defend capitalism you are defending the tax rates we have today and saying that higher absolute tax rates are more progressive tax rates that they don't agree with. I don't think Warren and I disagree that taxes could be made more progressive; in fact, we have been very explicit in some areas like the estate tax and have said that we think it would be. The good thing is that

socialism

emerged from where she came back.

Socialism used to mean that the state controlled the means of production and many people who promote socialism are not really using that classic definition, so what we are going to have is capitalism with some level of taxes, most people really don't is arguing against capitalism, there may be some, but most people just say that taxes should change, although there is someone who I think is running second highest and the Democratic Party right now. who was a socialist until very recently Bernie Sanders, well, whether he was a socialist or not for the entire term, now there are some monetary areas when you start saying that there shouldn't be

bill

ionaires, that you have some limit to wealth or something like that.

Well, that goes beyond what I think and you could say that I am selfish, the current government needs to reallocate some resources. I mean, the extreme case would be in World War II. I mean, that's the closest we've ever gotten to socialism. in a Price Administration office you had a war production board, yes, I mean, but in peacetime you are always prepared for war. Nia does that through the government. The government needs to reallocate some resources, but the market system that exists under capitalism is an extraordinarily effective way. and it is proven that human and other resources are used to produce incredible goods and Henry Ford was able to learn to devise a system that could produce a couple of million cars a year, but he could only use half a dozen so his entire family could wear. 50 I mean he had to produce a couple of million cars that other people could use and that, in my opinion, that wouldn't have happened.

I think if you had created a Government Office in 1850 and given them a hundred years, I would have ever come up with something like Ford's assembly lines and all the things that have happened. Human ingenuity is incredible and you want something that maximizes its use and then stops some people who may have this or that, but for everyone. Charlie, you have done the great test of how capitalism works in China, when China copied Singapore and left the farmers in their own plots and the manufacturers in their own businesses, etc. China's productivity increased many-fold and they went from rural poverty to modern extreme wealth and they did so by adopting a fair amount of capitalism.

No, the Democratic politician does not understand that he is crazy. However, Charlie has said the same thing that he believes the private sector does much better than the government sector. of these people running also want to make the government much bigger, did you have a problem with that or now? Well as they say if you love your post office you will love socialized medicine, they want to make it bigger in terms of redistribution, maybe wanting the market system is brutal and leaves behind people who are perfectly wonderful people who have no talents related to the market and they just have bad luck, yes, just bad luck, and in a rich society, believe me if we have a war or something. but we call those people and I will pay them virtually nothing to fight for us and we want the products to slow down, but it will displace the textile worker that we use, so the government's role is not necessarily To grow, it may be important to take care of people who, for one reason or another, are left behind in a market system that you also consider to be essentially a huge source of wealth, goods and services, so how do you fix it? the problems or at least the perception of the problems there is a huge perception out there and the American bloat right now would obviously help make our government wiser and it would be wiser if the two sides didn't hate each other so much.

It expels reason and there is a cold and absolute fury between the politicians on one side and the politicians on the other. It is quite counterproductive, which is why I don't allow myself to get angry with the politicians. How would you fix it? I just don't let myself get angry with politicians. that angry politicians I don't expect to do Bursar's job better because Charlie and I have never been like that with each other, yeah, it just is, I mean, much better, we get angry with each other. Did you know that I try to end their agreements?

I would try to help close the deal, it just doesn't work that way, we don't need a couple of alpha males to handle the bravado or these things to just cool them off, take a little hit to their reputation and get the feathers, but we, Otto, We should worry about the people who then don't end up with the system, but we want the system and many people are falling further and further behind because as capitalism advances, it becomes more specialized and, in fact, there is a greater difference among those who have. and the have nots and the haves could take care of the have nots, that means both sides and basically agree that just yes, how do you get there, it's a tax credit, it can take a big leap.

In that direction, I mean. without Social Security all of that we have done several things over the years we have improved we have improved the public school systems we have improved things that give people more equal opportunities and take care of the people who fall by the wayside you just have to keep doing it