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Calls to tax the superrich grow as economic inequality surges
(www.aljazeera.com)
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this post was submitted on 06 Sep 2023
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But those regulations are constantly labeled as "anticapitalist" -- because they are.
Why is it so wrong to poke at the inner workings of capitalism? Why must it be infallible?
Because the people benefiting from its brokenness aren't ready to stop salting the earth for numbers.
...I think you may have misread my comment.
I'm saying it's broken and asking why it should be accepted as infallible.
I thought they were just agreeing with you, FWIW
You're right - but I can see how the tone was interpreted as oppositional, I could have worded it differently to direct that more clearly. No harm afaik, lol.
Capitalism really is trading goods for currency, and allowing lending and investment. What's going on though, with unchecked companies and laughable fines, ruins the whole thing. In its current state, capitalism will be our undoing, but with proper laws, regulations and oversight, it could work.
The problem is, corps have grown too powerful already and can blackmail governments. It's like other models that could work in theory, but never benefit the people in the end. Communism tends to lead to tyranny, for example.
People are just really shit at designing and running big societies.
Capitalism isn't trading good for/with currency though. Socialist and Communist societies would still use currency as it is a lot easier than bartering everything. And in Socialists society, you can still have lending and investments.
Capitalism is the means of production and trade owned by private entities (be it a person or a corporation) to make profits.
You are right though, inevitably, capitalism leads to consolidation and monopolies which we see today.
This "barter" economy as a primary means of exchange never existed. It's a myth and a lie created by capitalists (actually by one Adam Smith) trying to rationalize the adoption of coinage and currency in ancient civilization.
In fact barter economies tend to arise predominantly in capitalism during periods of economic instability. Ie: after natural disasters, in war torn countries, etc.
The proper term you are looking for is "gift economy" and it is how the world worked before capitalism. I want something from you so you gift it to me with the implicit understanding that if in the future the roles are reversed I give something to you of relatively equal perceived value.
It was actually pretty rare that gifts were paid back in full in one transaction and often larger gifts were paid back through a series of transactions.
TIL that during the 16th to 19th centuries the aristocrats benefited from a "gift economy" because no one who ever says this knows what Mercantilism was.
Where did I mention the 16th or 19th centuries? And mercantilism was 100% not a barter economy. It was a form of market economy controlled by the state.... so I'm pretty sure it's you who misunderstands what mercantilism is.
Mercantilism was purely extractive, and thus completely immoral, I agree. However, trade does predate capitalism because capitalism was not a nominal economic system at the time and mercantilist countries traded with one another.
Trade is not barter. And if it involved coinage or it isn't barter. It's a form of market economy.
Market Economy ≠ Barter
Capitalism, Socialism and Communism are only how the means of production/trade is owned. Wage labor can still exist.
In capitalism, the means of production and trade are owned by private entities. Worker trade their labour for a set wage. All the profit goes to the owner/shareholder.
In socialism, the worker owns the means of production and trade. If a coop is more profitable than the next one, the worker of the first coop get more money. The profits are distributed amongst the workers that produced the goods. The workers own the coop/company.
In communism, the state owns the mean of production. The profits of the coop/company goes back to the state and are then redistributed in the society.
Socialism can still have investment, but the returns necessarily be money. A certain good is needed. The worker pool their money to build a factory and make a successful product. The workers then get a return on their investment (they make more money than they initially had).
All those examples are capitalism and changes absolutely nothing for humanity except the shape of the slave driver. Your mistake is thinking of commodity production and wage labor as unchanging, eternal states of being which comes from the bourgeois economic ideology taught to you, a notion Marx already destroyed. There was a "before" capitalist production and there will be an "after"
What are you babling on about? Production can be an artisan making one spoon a year or a factory making a million pcb a month.
In the end, the way that output is managed defines the economic system.
Because it was in the context of the current system.
Trading with currency is the basis for capitalism. Capitalism is lending/investing. When you don't have any actual wares at hand, but currency, virtual value, you trade for higher future virtual value.
You could barter cows and still be in a capitalistic society. It just wouldn't be
Currency is just a way to simplify a transaction. I have a cow thatis valued at 100$. I get 100$ that I then spend on whatever. I don't need to trade a cow for a 100 eggs, then keep 10 eggs and trade for butters.
Lending isn't inherently capitalistic. I can lend a 100$ to my friend to start a business and he gives me back a 100$ after a time, no interest.
Communism is when the government steals your cows and gives you back the milk as rations.
Capitalism is when you have somebody milk the cow for you and then you sell the milk and get rich and everyone calls you Mr Milkman the Millionaire.
As you can see capitalism is a much preferable system.
Colonial America enters the chat
That's commerce. Commerce predates capitalism, by a lot.
Capitalism also involves other things that go beyond basic commerce, such as systems of property law to incorporate quasi-sovereignty to capital ownership. That's more or less where we get the default model of businesses as de facto dictatorships ruled by the owner, vs. being democracies organized by stakeholders or participants. It's a big, deep subject that's unfortunately talked about in reductionist terms a lot. It's probably not helpful that a lot of early (and recent) scholarship on capitalism seems to frame itself as revelation of the nature of capital and markets, as if capital and markets are natural forces and not man-made things.
This last bit- treating capital and economics as if they were laws of nature (instead of being contrived by men)- does a lot of work to obfuscate fundamental systems of power, which in turn helps keep that power unaccountable. One major source of tension between capitalism and socialism has to do with whether the sovereignty of ownership ought to be democratized or subject to democratic accountabilities.
Some examples of being subject to democratic authority is basic labor protections, the 40 hour work week, safety regulations- if the voters impose on employers the requirement that employers provide a safe working environment, it's a counterweight to the general notion that owning the business makes one king of everything in that sphere- that is, it subordinates capital to the authority of the polity in which it operates.
I don't think you understand how concentrated power causes society to serve the few over the many.
As long as the disparity in wealth (power) grows, more people are incentivized to serve fewer. It's why we see the government controlled by the wealthy. It will always be this way (and get worse) so long as the disparity in wealth continues to grow.
This is by design.
Regulation and reform isn't anti-capitalist though.
"Real" anti-capitalism lies in the realisation that this system cannot be reformed, the status quo must be dismantled if we ever want to move past it and truly work towards values of freedom and equality.
That distinction would be a hard sell for most capitalists I know. Regulation itself is seen as tampering with the "free market", and therefore anticapitalist.
Capitalism isn't infallible. Externalities to capitalism are well-understood.
The problem is that the particular criticism being leveled there is nonsensical. We don't live within a finite system. New avenues of growth are constantly appearing, in both "typical" production methods and, most especially, service sector.
The idea that capitalism even requires infinite "growth" is problematic because "growth" is indefinable in the way this criticism is being leveled.
To add on, this criticism is generally leveled by "de-growth" elements of socialists/communists, who also cannot explain why those systems don't also require "growth" to provide for increasing numbers of people or how "growth" can be offset aside from simply not providing enough resources for people, which has unpleasant undertones.
You're splitting hairs about what people call growth when the term is used most commonly to refer to the ROI and the issue with sustainable business. A perfectly sustainable business is viewed unfavorably if it doesn't generate increased revenue beyond inflation. I.e. a company makes a revenue jump but no "new profits", it gets sandbagged.
The coop business model says "profits" get returned to member/owners as capital credits. Everyone employed can still do really well, members get value for their money, and investors can go fuck themselves.
We need more co-ops.
All* businesses that don't make money are viewed unfavorably because they aren't succeeding.
*Except, ironically, businesses buoyed by investment capital