Sometimes I glance at what is going on in Spain for the heck of it since I still have kin up there. This one comes from a Twitter guy I follow, @el_espia_vago and I caught the tweet above this morning.
If you know tools, you know Bosch makes some seriously good stuff. We had drills and other power tools by them that lasted decades till they finally gave up the ghost because of ager and wear. So yes, they sell a lot and make a profit. But Catalonia has moved firmly into the Socialism realm and apparently to the point where they have become poisonous to commerce and obviously companies that want to make a profit, cannot exist in an environment that wants to suck the marrow from their corporate bones to feed its followers.
Reading the replies of the tweet, I come to find out that since Catalonia moved to full Socialism, over 7,000 companies have packed and moved to better latitudes. And the author of the tweet has gone as far as demanding to nationalize the local Nissan factories in Catalonia which was rejected by his allies but it was brought forward that they could come up with extra taxes and other “obligations” to “help the people” and to make competition illegal. Yeah, that is gonna work so well.
The sad truth is that if Bosch or any company leaves, there is nothing they can do to keep the jobs working. Nationalization only works (stop laughing) if you manage to keep the brain trust that runs the company and then only willingly. And the confiscation move also creates a problem of trust as in nobody will trust your word ever again and will demand payment in advance till trust is generated. That drain of cash usually kills the People’s Company faster than a firing squad.
We are seeing some of the same in the US with companies and people migration from NY and California. I reckon that we will also see companies shifting production back to Mexico and China under the new DC administration because of the same reasons as always: Government being idiotic anti business.
You’d figure people would learn, but nope! It does not catch apparently.
PS: Just saw this. It illustrates quite well, don’t you think?
Most of the twits I see on FB go on about ‘Democratic Socialism’ and ‘roads are socialism derp derp’. They imagine the US as some sort of perfect utopia if we only followed the examples of countries like Norway or Sweden.
None of them realize that if the US continues on this path, it will be more like Greece, Spain, or Venezuela w/ a ‘hold my beer’ moment thrown in.
There is a great book entitled “The Problem With Socialism” that is still available on Amazon last time I checked. Buy it, read it, give it to your acquaintances that might be leaning left. Included is debunking of the myth of “but Socialism works in Scandinavia!”
… and much more!
“If you know tools, you know Bosch makes some seriously good stuff. ”
Bosch used to have a great reputation for automotive parts, too. No longer, though. Much of their stuff nowadays is Chineseum and failure-prone.
Indeed. We have a Bosch washer/dryer. The dryer is tolerable; the washer is a PC piece of garbage that uses hardly any water and as a result washes very poorly and takes several hours to do so.
I’m seriously tempted to buy a hotel grade washer…
That is sad to hear.
Just did some reading. There are still top loader machines, commercial and home grade, and some advertise “deep water” as a feature. Which means that they do not do the PC “save water” nonsense and are likely to work well. We actually still have a Maytag top loader, about 40 years old at this point, that does that — but it’s so worn out that it only gets used for the “nasty ugly” wash jobs.
Speed Queen TR3 “Full Tub Wash & Rinse” fills the entire tub with water to achieve maximum cleanliness.
Yes, that’s one I found. Do you have it? Like it?
Bosch sells quality dishwashers. The rest of their household appliances are crap.
And, only buy the dishwashers in the 500 or higher series. The 100 and 300 series dishwashers are just rebranded whirlpools (absolute garbage) or hotpoints.
If you are not paying in the $1000 range, odds are it is not made by Bosch, and will not live up to the expected quality.
Have said this in the past, but I think an idealized socialism/communism is great. Imagine everyone working for the common good. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?
However, that concept 100% ignores human nature. A strong personal self interest (some will call it greed) will take precedent over caring about others.
Reality is that I want to make sure my belly is full before I start caring whether you are even getting basic nutrition and enough calories to survive. Yes, I guess I am greedy because I want to be comfortable before I care about your hunger.
I want to have a home that is warm, secure, and roomy before I take any action to provide even the most basic shelter to others.
My kids will get the best education I can get them before I start caring about whether you kids can add 2+2.
Socialism demands that I settle for less than I have the potential to achieve, in order to provide others with basics they have not earned.
And, the children clamoring for socialism wonder why companies and the people who make those companies successful leave when they use Government authority to reduce their standards of living.
Socialism is an economic cargo cult mixed with 19th century pseudo-science. To work, it decrees that people should stop acting like people, which means it never works.
Capitalism, or he Free Market, or whatever term you want to use to describe the Adam Smith thing is not a utopian vision of what may be, but a description of how people function. The more free people are to function naturally, the better things are.
The major flaw in Leftist Labor Theory is that the market exist for the purpose of giving people jobs. It doesn’t- it exist to sell people things they want.
And the ‘sell to people things they want’ model is actually far better to everyone, workers included, than the ‘give people jobs’ model.
I would think the general political climate there has not got to be helping. ID think twice about it keeping my business there if there were independence and succession referendums. That doesn’t exactly spell stability.
It seems that a lot of recent secession movements are driven by socialists. I don’t count Brexit, that didn’t involve seceding from a nation. But Quebec, Scotland, Catalonia — those all seem to be promoted by socialist parties.
Earlier ones in Eastern Europe (Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia) are different; those were invented “countries” that split into the actual historic countries out of which they were slapped together by politicians. Ditto of course the USSR, where conquered nations freed themselves. And nearly a century earlier the same was true for Norway.