Slashdot Mirror
Intellectual Property And The AIDS Crisis
Karl Chang writes: "The New York Times Magazine cover story on AIDS is basically an expose on how the drug companies are trying to keep their profits at the expense of the lives of those in the third-world. Some shocking statistics are included about the spread of the epidemic and the markup on the drugs. Interestingly enough, the claim of patents being needed to finance new research is rebutted with the statistic that two-thirds of the drug companies costs are in marketing and administration; the bulk of their costs aren't in R&D. Read the story."
If you have a lot of time to sink into the issue of AIDS in Africa, and you want it presented in a less judgemental tone, check out the soon-to-be-Pulitzer winning series from the Washington Post called AIDS in Africa. This series goes into a lot of detail (a lot of detail- read only if you have lots of time) about the history of the epidemic, the complicating factors (lack of education, communication, Christianity + tribal taboos, etc.) and about the role of the drug companies. Like I said, a lot less judgmental than this particular article- I highly recommend it to everyone.
That said, even though the Post tries very hard not to have an anti-drug-company agenda, if you can walk away from reading all those articles without feeling that the drug companies are not culpable for the deaths of tens of millions of people... well, you are more of a cynic than I can imagine. What is happening in Africa is a terrifying combination of the Black Plague and the Holocaust, and after reading the Post series, there can be little doubt that our government and our medical industry is at the very least willing to stand by and watch millions die, and at worst directly responsible for those deaths. Yes, they need to do R&D, and yes, they should have the right to profit for their work. But when their stated policy is to profit via low-volume sales at high prices, instead of having the same ridiculous profits via high-volume sales at low prices, it is hard not to believe that the hands of their CEOs are not drenched in blood to an extent that makes tobacco CEOs look like saints.
Anyway, enough of that rant- go read the Post articles, and make the judgement for yourself.
~luge
IAAL,BIANLY
This isn't a case of "capitalists and the corporate republic and patents are killing millions in Africa". This is a case of Africans and African beliefs killing themselves through denial and stigmatizations.
The article is about one problem. And you're talking about another. The article is talking about the physical needs (drugs and money). You're talking about the cultural problem (awareness, education, stigma, rejection).
This is fine. But I take issue with your use of the word 'blame'. You see, by introducing this word, you're creating a third problem. Because when you blame someone, there's a subtle implication:
"Its' their own fucking fault and they deserve all they fucking get for their own fucking stupid idocy and don't come fucking pleading to us for fucking help."
Blame doesn't get you anywhere. Actually it just gets in the way. Because there's a difference between action/consequences and blame.
When I blame somebody, I'm avoiding looking at my own respons-ability. That's the ability to respond. If we start blaming companies or witch doctors, we're forgetting our ability to respond to the situation.
Otherwise, drug companies will just blame the witch doctors, while the third world governments blame capitalist greed. While actually a concerted effort by all parties will get everybody a lot further more quickly.
I'm sure cootch knows this anyway -- I'm just saying that blame is not going to help.
When I'm looking to blame, I'm looking for how, "it's nothing to do with me." But when I'm looking for how I'm responsable, I'm looking for what I can do. How can the drug companies respond. How can the governments respond. How can the village witch doctors respond. How can South African citizens respond. How can Kenyan teachers respond. How can American citizens respond. But don't blame.
We don't blame restaurants for not giving free food to the starving masses, why do you blame drug companies for not giving free medicine to the diseased masses
because restaurants don't have legally enforced monopolies on food.
If you could buy AIDS medicines for $2 at Wendy's, I doubt people would be getting upset at the drug companies. They'd be raising money to buy it from Wendy's at wholesale...
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Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
First off, you should probably say "socialist" instead of "communist".
A good response, but if you read the article, you'd see that there are mechanisms by which the government can "buy out" a company's IP rights. In fact, there are multiple mechanisms, including compulsory licensing or the more drastic seizing of the rights (for a price, of course).
The law actually has the flexibility. The fault lies in the execution of it; for a time the Clinton administration was guilty of pandering only to the pharma industry's interests, but they did slowly and halfheartedly.
Misapplication and misuse of IP laws is certainly not new; there have been patent lawyers and companies working to exploit the law for profit rather than for societal benefit since the laws began. But as the US laws become the world laws, the exploitation is spreading across the globe.
You can bet what tack the Bush administration will take. Hooray for pharma stock!
Of the 1st-world countries, it is the US that by far needs to take responsibility on this issue.
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Make mine methylphenidate.
That argument is simply bullshit. Most AIDS research is funded in whole or in part by governmental (aka OUR) money. The only reason these companies can charge that much for drugs is because governments act as their muscle.
The thrust of the article wasn't that companies shouldn't be allowed to turn a profit; it was that they shouldn't be allowed to turn an obscene profit. As people have repeatedly pointed out, drug companies are not charging high prices just to cover R&D. Most of their profits go into advertising and paying their executives.
As a good post-modernist, I try to avoid taking moral stands; neither the article nor most of the Slashdot readership has called the companies 'evil'. However, it's difficult not to find something wrong with people, governments, and companies placing a higher priority on milking profit than saving millions upon millions of lives.
In a purely free market, there wouldn't be any IP protection; it's an artificial governmental restraint. Intellectual property law is supposed to be in service of society; and I hope that most of society doesn't believe that allowing companies to charge $21000 a year for drugs that cost $700, drugs which mean the difference between a slow, painful, debilitating death, and a healthy, productive life, is in the service of society.
Don't take a moral stand; just decide whether you'd rather the continent of Africa to collapse into complete anarchy, and much of east Asia, and perhaps Latin America too (oh no! where will we get our cheap processors and jeans?).
There are many other entities at fault in this equation. India, for example, is the number one producer of generic copycat drugs, but refuses to provide free AIDS treatment to its teeming masses. The only reason that I am attacking the drug companies so vociferously is that fools like you defend them.
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Make mine methylphenidate.
> And say what you will about Bill Gates, but at least he isn't hoarding all his wealth.
Hmmm. He's worth $72,273,900,000 right now, and his $100,000,000 is spread out over the next five years, so his yearly donation of $20,000,000 is worth a whopping 0.02767% of his net worth.
An ordinary millionaire would have to give a budget-busting $276.73 per year to keep pace. Someone worth $100,000 would have to hurt themselves to the tune of $27.67 per year -- that's a decent steak dinner, I'm telling you. A working highschooler could keep up by throwing a quarter in the hat once a year.
"Capitalism overcoming the shortcomings of capitalism", indeed!
All hail to Saint Bill of Borg! He steals from the rich -- or at least limits himself to the working class and above -- and throws pocket change to the poor -- at least when the media are watching.
Sorry, Bill, but this is only going to buy the love of people without a pocket calculator.
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> Bill Gates has donated in excess of $10 billion to charity. In both relative and absolute terms, that's extremely generous.
I know I should let this ride, but I just can't resist...
Let's see. He's worth $72G now, and if you add back the $10G that he has reportedly given away, you get $82G, of which that $10G is... 12%. Your family doctor probably gives away a bigger share. Lots of middle class families give away a tithe just on general principles. If you compare on the basis of disposable fortune rather than gross, the attempts to portray Gates as a philanthropist look absolutely ridiculous.
This is not an impressive sum for the world's richest man.
And then you look at the $10G. How much is still sitting in the coffers of his self-aggrandizing Gates Foundation? How much was given away with strings attached? How much was given away as software, and reckoned at the sticker price rather than the almost-nothing that it actually costs him personally?
How much was given away before he started having legal and PR problems? How much did he give away without a press release to tell the world about it? How often do his disciples invoke his donations as proof that he's a nice guy, never mind whatever he did to get the money in the first place?
> You are a jealous hypocrite.
Jealous? No. (See below.)
Hypocite? You're making a lot of assumptions about what I'm worth and where it goes.
> Be honest and admit you hate Bill Gates because he's more successful than you.
Actually, I don't consider him successful at all, because I'm one of those freaks who doesn't believe that you "win" by dying with the most toys. Sure, he's got piles of cash and herds of brown-nosers, but I don't happen to want either one. I've got enough to eat and live under a roof and drive a car that doesn't break down too often, and enough left over for a few toys. Whenever I discover that I've got much more than that, I figure I've been spending too much time making a living and not enough time living a life, so I switch gears for a while. What makes you suppose everyone wants to be like him?
Is he handsome? Has he got a winning personality? Lots of friends? Do girls fawn on him? Has he got musical talent? Does he speak lots of languages? Does he write novels or poetry? Paint? Hack on a project for fun? Does he do lots of cool stuff that other people don't?
Sorry, but I'll save my jealousy for more deserving guys.
> Short of donating his entire fortune to charity, there's nothing he could possibly do to make you like him.
I probably wouldn't like him even then, though I would probably respect him for that particular act. Maybe even be jealous, if I found that I couldn't do the same thing.
> Here's my response: learn basic economics. The economy is not a zero-sum game.
Was that supposed to be relevant to some point you were trying to make?
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
They have a profit margin of 16.9%.
That is not at all a high profit margin.
Coca-Cola's is around 28%; Microsoft's is 38.9%. Intel is 24.5%. General Electric, an old line commodity product company is 16.5%.
Investment analysts like the Motley Fool recommend that you do not invest in a company unless their margin is at least 10% as otherwise they will not have the ability to fund future expansion, or weather an economic recession.
Drug Companies spend their money developing these product which save lives, of course they are going to charge money for them. Of course. By the logic of the poster, the companies should be expected to give thier product away for free because, well hey, the drugs save lives? If they don't have the ability to make money on the drugs that they invent and develop themselves they will never develop any new drugs and we'll be in a lot bigger trouble in the long run. I'd rather have AIDS drugs expensive today and have a cure for that plague that's coming tomorrow, than have them free today and nothing in the future.
Think ahead people, you're living in today and it's going to destroy your future.
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RumorsDaily
You are bleading in your car after a crash. The paramedic looks in the window and asks if you have $100 before he will help you.
He has the IP in that he knows how to help you.
He has the PP in his kit.
He has a right to charge what he wants for his these things.
I think even the most strident freemarket supporter would say that to withhold medical care is wrong. Is it realy so different when the IP is a drug and the crash victom is from the third world?
Hmmm. He's worth $72,273,900,000 right now, and his $100,000,000 is spread out over the next five years, so his yearly donation of $20,000,000 is worth a whopping 0.02767% of his net worth.
Bill Gates has donated in excess of $10 billion to charity. In both relative and absolute terms, that's extremely generous. Have you donated more than 10% of your net worth to charity? I doubt it. Have you donated more than $10,000,000,000 to charity? Not a chance. You are a jealous hypocrite. Bill Gates is not.
Be honest and admit you hate Bill Gates because he's more successful than you. Short of donating his entire fortune to charity, there's nothing he could possibly do to make you like him.
The same goes for all those people out there for bashing pharmaceutical companies for being greedy and spending only 33% of their income on R&D (a far greater percentage than any other industry).
What really pisses me off is all you people who scream about others being greedy when you haven't done anything to help others.
I know what you're going to say... Here's my response: learn basic economics. The economy is not a zero-sum game.
Interestingly enough, the claim of patents being needed to finance new research is rebutted with the statistic that two-thirds of the drug companies costs are in marketing and administration; the bulk of their costs aren't in R&D.
However good this may sound, this "argument" is a non-sequitur. What has one (cost of R&D/marketing) thing to do with the other (benefits of the patent system)? Who has ever claimed that a monopoly on the use, sale or marketing of a product would somehow impact upon the costs of manufacturing, advertising and distribution of the same? Still further, the study hardly segregated marketing of patent-related goods against costs of marketing of non-patent-related goods, so the result is itself unuseful.
But for the R&D, there would be no drugs. But for the drugs, there would be nothing to market. No incentive to R&D, no drugs.
If there were drugs, by luck or otherwise, the lack of a monopoly would not justify the investment in marketing, for a generic free-rider would simply sell and distribute their goods at much reduced costs and therefore, for greater margins. No sales, no incentive to R&D or marketing, no drugs.
Unsurprisingly, margins on patented products *ARE* higher than margins on unpatented products. Valuations of pharmaceudical companies and price/equity *ARE* higher for those holding patent technologies than for those who are not.
There may well be argument to be made to support the conclusion, but this one certainly is not. The relative expenses of a company's marketing verses R&D hardly neither supports nor defeats arguments about the virtue of the patent system.
This is not to say unconcionable things have not happened in this business -- only that the argument singled out here isn't part of the best case against either the patent system or that business.
What we're noticing here is that the cost of drugs could be cut in half if marketeers and executives (who are undeniably useless to the final product) were fired.
... were fired' is like saying the human body would be 50% more efficient if it didn't have to also provide for it's brain. The trick is that without it's brain the human body is completely useless.
After this comment and re-reading the slashdot article by michael I figured I'd go and look into this allegation that 66% of drug companies' money goes to sales and administrative. For Meric (NYSE:MRK) the majority of their money goes into materials and production; about three times what goes into sales & administration, and nearly as much as S&A goes into R&D. Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) spends 37% on sales and administrative (still less than half) and spends as much on R&D and manufacturing combined. These are large companies with already developed product lines (i.e. they've done the research now they are in sales mode to recoup earlier R&D costs).
Smaller companies without established product lines, such as Biogen (NASDAQ:BGEN) spend close to 66% on R&D.
'Sales & Administrative' is sort of a catch-all category anyway. Most people are familiar with what their workplace does.. How many people actually make the product the business sells. How many people at a software company are programmers? The programmers need a support staff of HR people, administative assistants, an IS department, some executives, a few marketing guys, someone to manage facilitites, a receptionist... point is that at any given business the majority of the people don't contribute directly to the product but are important nonetheless. All these people show up as 'sales and administrative' on an income statement.
Finally saying that cost would be cut in half if 'executives
But of course when we're talking about an idealogical concept such as socialism who want's to really go into details.. The devil is always in the details.
What you are describing is called "speculation" to be kind, or "gambling" to be honest.
All technological advancement is based on risk (or call it speculation or gambling). You invest a billion dollars to find a cure for AIDS. After that billion is gone you may have a cure or you may not. There's no such thing as 'sure thing' research.
If we had any number of socialist countries selling into the export market on a cost-recovery basis, with shorter workweeks and better wages, the fat cat industrialists would have seen Daddy's fortunes disappear overnight or seen risks to their lives.
The socialist countries had shorter work weeks and better wages? It comes as a suprise to me that people in soviet-russia and china make more than americans. In fact this is just plain untrue. I do believe we've all but completely opened our market to communist china and it's billions of workers. I thank them for their cheap trinkets, but I've yet to see China turn into a luxurious worker's paradise or seen the downfall of the american capitalist.
-- Greg
Slashdot, would a spell-checker for posting be too much to ask? It's not rocket science!
The drug companies used to sell drugs to the third world countries at the cost-of-manufacture. Know why they don't anymore? Because americans were angry that they had to pay more for drugs than third world countries. The drug companies used american revinues to offset R&D and administrative costs (enabling new research into newer drugs).
Americans were unhappy about this situation; they went so far as to get congress ready to pass laws encouraging re-importation of drugs allowing americans to buy drugs at third-world prices.
This is why the prices for drugs have gone up in the third world; Even when the drug companies were trying to be charitable to the less fortunate all they got was a PITA from americans who wanted something for nothing too.
Re-writing the laws now to allow anyone to take the drug companies' intelectual property is just going to make expensive experimental research much more risky for businesses, and therefore that sort of research that might cure AIDS or cancer will be curtailed drastically. No business in their right mind is going to spend billions to research a cure only to have somebody down the street copy it a week within it's invention and sell it at cost-of-manufacture while the first drug company cannot charge enough to recoup their R&D costs.
Next usual argument against drug companies is that they return so much back to their investors in profit and thats why the price of drugs is so high. Let me dispel that one this way. For every company that spends billions and ends up with a hard-on or bald-spot pill resulting in big profits for stockholders there are ten companies who each spent billions and ended up with zilch. Of course the 'payout' has to be a good amount if the chances of getting anything back at all are so low.
Any of you arguing the merits of socialism vs. capitalism just need to look at the achevements of the west vs. the east over the 50 years of the cold war. Sure both sides sent people to space and built sizable armies, which side benefited their common-man the most? The west had microwaves, TV's, cars, houses, ready amounts of food & goods, and appliances. The east had almost no non-military innovation (that they didn't steal from the west); the people lived with constant shortages, small cramped apartments with the minimum of comforts, and poor working conditions. I think I'll choose capitalism over socialism any day.
-- Greg
Slashdot, would a spell-checker for posting be too much to ask? It's not rocket science!
but do not just blame the drug companies for the extent that AIDS is attacking Africa. Blame their governments for not spending money on AIDS awareness. Blame the tribal leaders and hell, the men of the cities and tribes for not wearing a condom because they feel strongly that it makes them less of a man. And blame the communities that stigmatize the people that have AIDS and are so afraid to get treatment, let alone let anyone else know, that is causing a greater spread of the disease.
This isn't a case of "capitalists and the corporate republic and patents are killing millions in Africa". This is a case of Africans and African beliefs killing themselves through denial and stigmatizations. It's just that the drug companies aren't helping the matter all that much. But I don't see this as a huge problems since the majority of the people in Africa that have contracted the disease refuse to admit it and refuse to get treatment.
here's some links:
link 1
link 2
link 3
If there wasn't profits in AIDS research, governments would fund it, andthus the taxpayers.
The main problem with the medical / biotech industry right now is, that they have realized that a cure / vaccine is a BAD thing. They can make much more money by only selling medical products that you have to take the rest of your life to survive.
They are getting worse than the drug dealer selling crack to kids in school.
The blame syndrome is part of how the Nazi's managed to keep their killing machine running. Each person was responsible for only one stage of the process. Someone would open the door. Another person would run the ventilation machine. The guards simply escorted people from place to place. Someone else, entirely, was responsible for clearing the bodies out afterwards. Various other people did the paperwork, but weren't physically involved in the actuall killing.
Who among them was responsible for the deaths? Any one of them could say that if somebody else had refused to do their part that the killing would have stopped. A call to take responsibility is a call to say this part is mine to control. You may want to call on others to do their part, as well, but your actions are what you control directly.
Drug companies are oriented to maximize their profits. They lobby various governments to change the laws to allow even greater profits, and then blame the government when the changed laws lead to excesses. We need to hold the people to account -- each for their own stage. It's fine to say that there are cultural problems in various nations (not like there were none here in North America!). Just don't use it as an excuse to take anybody else off the hook.
`ø,,ø!
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
Hey, Taiwan does not have the same problems with aids that places like Veitnam and Thailand do, damnit. We are fine. We arn't some damn 3rd world contry like Burma!
Amber Yuan 2k A.D
"and dear god does this website suck now." -- CmdrTaco
I don't care how they try to justify the case for stoping others from having the medicine they to survive, there is simply no excuse for holding back medical aid to those in desperate need.
It seems to me that the drug companies that are not supplying medications to third world aids victims have forgotten why exactly our society has given them property rights over information: To further the sciences, for the benefit of humanity.
Now we all know how honest and altruistic large companies are.
Heck, even Bill Gates has recently donated 100 million dollars to aids research. The obvious arguement is that we should not criticise them for the good they do. Bill Gates has obviously been a benefactor of the computer community, and so we should not criticise him for possible errors. He has done so much good.
That statement will obviously send people screaming out of the room. ;-)
The real question is the question of the devils bargin: How much do we excuse in the way of possible errors or abuse because of the possible benefit?
an example from another area of life: a very elderly elderly person is placed into a nursing home. Someone is named as the guardian. the idea is to self off property to help make the remaining years comfortable, because they are beloved family. And the argument is made to loot the property for personal gain instead of helping this person. This is something that happens, I have seen an interesting varient of this.
How much should you be able to profit from the mis-fortune of others?
I have no problem with the meeting of costs, and even some small profit to help a little with future development. Sadly once in the coffers, the bean counter types take cover, and will disperse the funds according to other principles
So how often should we shoot the messenger? Even the infamous Evil Overlord's List has the famous rule:
"32.I will not fly into a rage and kill a messenger who brings me bad news just to illustrate how evil I really am. Good messengers are hard to come by."
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
well, before I open my big mouth, I would like to know just how many millions of US taxpayers dollars are going into AIDS research so that some capitalist fuckwit can "own" the "intelletual property".
That is bullshit, and I wager it's not a small amount of our money. I'm sick of the government stealing my money and giving it to corporations.
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Your poor country is suffering from plague, your family is dying, and a strange organization is a far away land states that you do not have the right to cheaply produce the medication your family needs to survive, because said organization spent the money to develop this, and you cannot afford to buy it from them.
So then through capitalist ethics, you say oh well, dont buy the drugs (since you can't) watch your family and countrymen die, and capitalism remains intact so that the betterment of humanity may continue.
...or you can die on your feet, and maybe the corporation will cave in, and you just might live. That is what you learn from Brazil.
This is a pretty polarized argument, as would be expected from a discussion which basically divides the capitalists from the communists. The truth is that neither abolishing intellectual property nor 100% free markets are good solutions, whether the topic of discussion is software or AIDS medicines.
What we need are more flexible intellectual property laws. We need to find a better way of balancing the interests of humanity with the interests of the individual. Our old, stiff IP laws are just not keeping up with the dynamic modern world.
People who are infected with AIDS should be able to get medicine at the cost of manufacturing the medicine, at most, if only because those drugs reduce contagion and help prevent spread of the disease. It is in the best interest of humanity to contain the worst epidemic since the Bubonic Plague.
However, drug companies need to be assured that they can recoup their investments, and should be able to make a healthy profit. We need to keep motivating them to do new research in productive areas of exploration. That's also in the best interest of humanity.
The real problem is that there is no mechanism for balancing the two interests. In the United States, the result of this imbalance is that huge corporations make millions of dollars on intellectual property, recouping far, far more than their investment. Look at Microsoft. They are pulling in more money than their actual contribution to society should justify. But businesses need the software to survive, so they pay the outrageously high fees.
However, in a country without any means of protecting intellectual property, nobody would make the initial investment. The current laws, based on expiration of intellectual property rights after a period of time, are on the right track but are too inflexible. For instance, software should go into the public domain faster than it currently does due to the rate of change in technology. Also, we need to establish a mechanism by which the government can "buy out" a company's IP rights and put them into the public domain. AIDS drugs would be a prime target for this.
include $sig;
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The Disease that was ravaging the world: The Black Shakes?
The company that was more interested in the profits from treating the disease than in actually curing it: PharmaKom?
And the AI that wanted to release the cure?
Once again, Life Imitates Art.
People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it.
It's amazing to me how much time people are willing to spend hyping this or that supposed AIDS problem, and how little time people are willing to spend on providing quality information about AIDS. It's also amazing to me the willful blindness most people have about this disease.
The assertion that drug companies are putting their profits ahead of lives in Africa is ludicrous. Pumping out enough AIDS/HIV medications to treat all of the HIV+ people in Africa and shipping it there at cost (without regard to marketing or promotion) would not stop the spread of the disease, nor would it save a significant number of lives. In the US, with a massive medical infrastructure, it is difficult to support the claim that these medications save any lives either. The idea that things would work even this well on a continent with problems of basic distribution and very little infrastructure (not to mention armed revolution) is silly.
The implication is that there is some pill that you take that keeps AIDS at bay indefinitely, and this just isn't the case. A treatment regimen for HIV involves a mixture of pills that have to be taken multiple times a day in a very specific fashion (with food, without food, different times of day, etc.), some of which require special treatment (like refrigeration). Religiously following this regimen may leave an individual with little to no measurable virus, and may slow the destruction of that person's immune system, but it will definitely bring major lifestyle impacts including the very real risk of major side effects which can be more difficult to live with than active HIV (not to mention more deadly). Following the regimen less religiously brings the very real danger of medication resistant virus taking over.
Throwing HIV medications into Africa, under current conditions, would do little to nothing for the masses of HIV+ people there -- those who have a stable enough situation that they can preserve the medications properly are few.
When people start talking about the realities of HIV tests and that they don't reliably show infection for six to twelve months after exposure, which means that having unprotected sex with someone after a few months puts you at risk regardless of how much you trust that person, then we'll have something available which can save lives.
I completely agree. For the past few months I've been arguing vigorously against my father about socialism/communism versus capitalism. The most common argument I get is 'human nature.' Everyone uses this little phrase to explain away any behavior that they can't understand. Why would anyone not want to share? Oh, well, I don't know so it must be human nature. Why are the humans the only species to periodically engage in the mass destruction of ourselves? Hmmm, must be our nature. Can't be the socialogical factors contributing to our behavior, or the subconscious influences we've recieved from anything and everything over the years. Nope, it's just undefiable human nature. Capitalists will argue that communism has failed and turned into despotism in its first implementations because it is against human nature. However, human nature doesn't really explain anything. It makes much more sense to me that the reason people cannout immediately adapt from capitalism to communism is because capitalism has been mentally entrenched in everyone's minds so firmly, that we don't even realize when we're being selfish. From birth we are taught to be responsible for ourselves, and not to worry about other people. The glamor associated with winning and being victorious in our society is incredible strong, and to suggest that this is so merely because it is human nature seems to me ludicrous. The other argument is that communism is undemocratic. This stems from the common perception that USSR/Despotism = Communism. THIS IS NOT SO. The minimal government that would initially exist should be entirely democratic. (Here was one failure of its first implementations - they had leaders! In a true communistic society, whoever gets the bright idea to set it up would be working in the fields right along side everyone else.) As history progresses, governments tend to get more progressive and geared towards the people, not less. The trend has gone from feudalism to monarchism to capitalism to a democratic republic; it is only logical that the next step would be one to where no one person is given importance over anyone else, where *every* occupation is democratic, and where every citizen is entitled to a roof over their head and three meals a day.