Is the Pokémon world a socialist paradise?

[coolcatkim22]

They most certainly do.

There are so many Pokemon mangas that the only one that really counts is Pokemon special.

 

[Pokeyomom]

O good lord. The regions don't need goverments lol:p There is one governing force, and that is who can take the most names, and kick the most butt with their team of pokemon. So it's pretty much Darwinist lolz.

 

[Apostrophe]

Doesn't greater efficiency create prosperity and more jobs?

Greater efficiency destroys jobs, because employers are able to do more work with less employees.

 

[Agent Cobalt]

Constitutional Monarchy...

Anyway, what's wrong with capitalism? I agree that the competition is bad, but no-one will ever be able to create a working socialist state anyway. No, wait... I've mixed socialism with communism.

I know it's a monarchy, but that just means it's not a republic. It's still a capitalist country as opposed to a socialist/collectivist nation.

And nothing is wrong with capitalism. It's the best system we've got. I wasn't saying capitalism was wrong if that's what you thought. I abhor the idea of a socialist world, real or fictional. I especially wouldn't want Pokemon, a shining example of capitalist market forces and supply & demand, to be tainted by pinko stank. XP

 

[GymLeaderMisty]

How is Pokémon capitalist? I guess it felt like the peak of an asset bubble in 1999.

So how is the Pokémon world in the anime an example of free market capitalism? The Pokémon Centers, most gyms (maybe Juan's gym and Cerulean Gym might be funded by their performances), the Pokémon League are all examples of socialism.

 

[Agent Cobalt]

How is Pokémon capitalist? I guess it felt like the peak of an asset bubble in 1999.

So how is the Pokémon world in the anime an example of free market capitalism? The Pokémon Centers, most gyms (maybe Juan's gym and Cerulean Gym might be funded by their performances), the Pokémon League are all examples of socialism.

Pokemon is a popular franchise that's been a product of the free market. I wasn't even speculating about the fictional world, I was talking about real life just for a second there.

 

[GymLeaderMisty]

Pokemon is a popular franchise that's been a product of the free market. I wasn't even speculating about the fictional world, I was talking about real life just for a second there.

If the Pokémon world were an Ayn Randian paradise, do you think a callow ten year old boy and a twelve year old girl would be able to survive it? Those type of people need their mommy or the state to provide them some resources. If it were a totally laissez-faire system, Delia Ketchum would not live in relative comfort, and Ash and Misty would work in sweatshops or factories.

 

[Agent Cobalt]

If the Pokémon world were an Ayn Randian paradise, do you think a callow ten year old boy and a twelve year old girl would be able to survive it? Those type of people need their mommy or the state to provide them some resources. If it were a totally laissez-faire system, Delia Ketchum would not live in relative comfort, and Ash and Misty would work in sweatshops or factories.

Uhuh, we all get that you're a socialist. You're arguing against a point I never made. In real life, Japan is capitalist and the Pokemon games, cards, shows, movies, toys, and comics are all part of a franchise that's spread from Japan to the West and proven an economic success and very popular. My post wasn't even talking about the hypothetical conditions of the fictional Pokemon world. I've already explained what I was talking about to you once, twice now including this post. I really hope I won't have to again.

 

[GymLeaderMisty]

Well, Japan isn't completely capitalist... it has keiretsus, merchantilist policies, large national debt and deficits, and a central bank that wants a weak yen. Not totally free-market... libertarians would abhor Japan. Let's have the Heritage Foundation (a right wing organization) enumerate their economic "sins" instead.

Now let's get back to the Pokémon world. There are capitalists within the Pokémon world (such as the restaurenteur in the Acapulco episode and Team Rocket (Jessie, James, and Meowth) during the end of Master Quest), but the overall world is socialist. If it were completely laissez-faire, the world would be a living hell for Ash and Misty.

 

[Agent Cobalt]

Well, Japan isn't completely capitalist... it has keiretsus, merchantilist policies, large national debt and deficits, and a central bank that wants a weak yen. Not totally free-market... libertarians would abhor Japan. Let's have the Heritage Foundation (a right wing organization) enumerate their economic "sins" instead.

1. Things like national debts are a key part of nations establishing credit and in no way denote a lack of capitalism.
2. Central banks do the same and are a way to supply the nations currency/coined money to the people to make economic transactions easier and convenient.
3. And who cares what Libertarians think? I'm not one, and they like to think they're classical liberals like the Founding Fathers but they're nothing of the sort. Libertarians aren't conservatives, and while they like to champion free markets, they're more than willing to support government regulation when it suits them (like legalizing pot but heavily taxing and regulating it).
4. A lot of the points made against Japan were about tariffs and trade. While less restrictions on trade are much more favorable in a capitalist system, free trade and capitalism are not the same. A country can be protectionist and still be capitalist; it just means the nation is looking out for its interests over foreign entities. Many American Federalists and Whigs supported some protectionism, not to limit capitalism and economic transactions, but to promote it and business and increase American industry. History has shown that free trade is superior to protectionism, however both are merely expressions of capitalism; capitalism is still the exchange of capital/labor between private forces.

 

[Taemin]

I.. I ...I don't even know what to say to this. xD;

Most 'what if' Pokemon topics are interesting to me, but this one.. >_> never thought I'd ever see anyone question the politics (or lack there of..) in Pokemon.

Honestly, I'm not sure I'd want to think about it either, because I can imagine if there were any type of Government, or ruling that was anything like one, that world be a lot different. With all the rules, I can imagine a lot of the Pokemon wouldn't be able to just roam wherever they pleased. I also doubt that 10-year-old kids would be allowed to leave their homes, and education behind to travel around the world. > >; I'm not gonna even touch on the economy.. but I can see a lot of the companies finding ways to harness a Pokemon's powers in a way that wouldn't be so nice.

& I doubt the human and Pokemon bond would be too strong.. :/ In general I mean.

 

[GymLeaderMisty]

1. Things like national debts are a key part of nations establishing credit and in no way denote a lack of capitalism.
2. Central banks do the same and are a way to supply the nations currency/coined money to the people to make economic transactions easier and convenient.
3. And who cares what Libertarians think? I'm not one, and they like to think they're classical liberals like the Founding Fathers but they're nothing of the sort. Libertarians aren't conservatives, and while they like to champion free markets, they're more than willing to support government regulation when it suits them (like legalizing pot but heavily taxing and regulating it).
4. A lot of the points made against Japan were about tariffs and trade. While less restrictions on trade are much more favorable in a capitalist system, free trade and capitalism are not the same. A country can be protectionist and still be capitalist; it just means the nation is looking out for its interests over foreign entities. Many American Federalists and Whigs supported some protectionism, not to limit capitalism and economic transactions, but to promote it and business and increase American industry. History has shown that free trade is superior to protectionism, however both are merely expressions of capitalism; capitalism is still the exchange of capital/labor between private forces.

I do not know about trade policy and the Pokémon world though. I guess the Alakazams are able to find a way to find the optimal trade policy and contruct policies that would deal with its negative consequences.

Protectionism actually benefits workers in developed countries by a simple mechanism: it reduces the labor supply by restricting access to cheap foreign labor intensive goods. In addition, unlike domestic labor that pays taxes, foreign labor (embodied in the form of cheap goods) do not pay taxes. Furthermore, they reduce tax revenue by putting downward pressure on domestic wages. By reducing the price of labor intensive goods, the price of labor (i.e. wages) would go down.

Where is the evidence that free trade leads to prosperity? The US did not prosper under a free trade regime in the 1950s. In fact, it benefited when China isolated itself from the world and from world socialism. Furthermore, a lot of the world's capital was destroyed in World War II removing some of the US' competitors. Perversely, if all the people in China and India died, it would benefit workers in developed countries similar to how survivors of the Black Death benefited from a shortage of workers. It just shows how in an unprotected free market, it is a "war of all against all." (Bellum omnium contra omnes) Chinese workers vs. Indian workers vs. domestic US workers vs. Central American immigrants fighting for a shrinking amount of jobs in the global labor market all driving wages down.

Also, game theory considerations might favor protectionism in certain cases. For example, consider a prisoner's dilemma scenario where it might be advantageous for both players to "cooperate" (engage in free trade) versus "defecting" (using protectionist measures.) In an uniterated prisoner's dilemma, there is incentive for each party to defect regardless what the other party does. The best outcome for a given player would be that they defect and the other party cooperates.

 

[GymLeaderMisty]

I just remembered that in a filler episode in Johto, that Natu and Xatu can be used to predict the weather. So why can't Alakazam and Metagross be used to run the government and replace human bureacracy? While conservatives usually argue that the government is an inefficient allocator of financial capital, who could argue that creatures with an intelligence 326 standard deviations from the human mean be an inefficient allocator of resources? In fact, it would be a sign of incompetence to say that humans would be a better allocator of capital while Alakazam has superior processing power and lacks the vulnerability of human politicians to be influenced by special interests.

It makes sense that the Pokémon world is a socialist technocracy.