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Is there a theoretical limit to profit?
(lemmy.world)
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this post was submitted on 17 Dec 2024
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Yes, there is a limit.
First, you need to look at the difference between 1. money and 2. value.
That theoretical one rich person (or company) might own all money printing facilities in the world, and therefore can make endless numbers. That is money, not value.
There is theoretically no limit for the money. But this is meaningless, because this kind of inflated money would be valueless.
The one rich person might own everybody else, and all their belongings, and all that they can produce.
That's all the value then. That's your limit.
And further on point 2, the limit would determined by all that people can produce as well as, on the minus side, the costs of keeping those people alive and producing.
As it so happens, people will produce more under better conditions, so spending the least amount possible keeping those people alive doesn't yield maximum profit - there is a sweet spot somewhere in the curve were the people's productivity minus the costs of keeping them productive is at a peak - i.e. profit is maximum - and that's not at the point were the people producing things are merelly surviving.
Capitalism really is just a way of the elites trying to get society to that sweet spot of that curve - under Capitalism people are more productive than in overtly autocratic systems (or even further, outright slavery) were less is spent on people, they get less education and they have less freedom to (from the point of view of the elites) waste their time doing what they want rather than produce, and because people in a Capitalist society live a bit better, are a bit less unhappy and have something to lose unlike in the outright autocratic systems, they produce more for the elites and there is less risk of rebelions so it all adds up to more profit for the elites.
As you might have noticed by now, optimizing for the sweet spot of "productivity minus costs with the riff-raff" isn't the same as optimizing for the greatest good for the greatest number (the basic principle of the Left) since most people by a huge margin are the "riff-raff", not the elites.