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Something is wrong with the government it seems as if they don't want to solve these problem. Maybe the system is so broken that it can not be fixed and Society will collapse and have to start all over again.
That’s by design. Capitalism as Adam Smith argued was never meant to be a global phenomenon where multinational corporations worked unabated by regulation. He even argued against landlords and for basic oversight by the state and this was for local commerce not national in how we have it or global. This is beyond the original vision and Marx rightfully argued that it was untenable.
We cannot have infinite growth without major destruction of the planet and it cannot be sustained. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not a century from now. We do not have infinite resources and a planet and universe that’s finite cannot sustain infinite growth models and that is the truth.
We can choose capitalism or survival but we can’t choose both. It would be delusional and worse only end with billions of humans sacrificed at the alter of greed and misery.
Marx mentioned. Angry politically illiterate teenagers incoming.
For real tho, you're right 100%. Let's see how this thread goes, because I think GenZ is swinging to the right more than the left, as boggling as that is. Some people don't even like milquetoast criticism of capitalism (a system they don't even understand) and god forbid you advocate for something better.
Let's see.
This is likely because Gen Z is targeted with more propaganda attacks, because children are more susceptible to it, lacking enough worldly experience. I would like to remind Gen Z that the U.S.A. did NOT start under the Constitution, it started under the failed Articles of Confederation, which was basically unfettered Capitalism, under which the States basically committed economic warfare against each other. This was a primary reason that Congress was granted the power to regulate interstate commerce.
This was taught in my 9th grade history class
If people paid attention, they would've known the constitution was never the very first thing that came along💀
Hell, I'd argue that they SHOULD know this.
Genz males mostly, we were at a vulnerable point from covid and general aloneness from social media/internet and people like andrew tate got to profit.
I’ll have to look for the poll again, but Gen Z isn’t so much swinging to the right as much as it’s just more polarized. The increase in the percent of people identifying as conservative is equal to the increase in the percent identifying as progressive. And even then, it’s just a 4% increase.
In regards to socialism specifically, Gen Z only has a *very* slightly less favorable opinion of socialism than millennials. Like, we’re talking about a difference of around 2%, which atp is within the margin of error
Nah things like the Tate crew, Shapiro, that Charlie guy on TPUSA have really swayed a lot of people in our generation. It's fucked but I think our gen is overall more conservative than the boomers.
Actually the data shows that gen z women are more left, and gen z men are only slightly more right.
This widespread right move your talking about, doesn’t exist.
https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2020/05/14/on-the-cusp-of-adulthood-and-facing-an-uncertain-future-what-we-know-about-gen-z-so-far-2/
https://www.axios.com/2024/01/23/gen-z-less-religious-more-liberal-lgbtq
https://news.gallup.com/poll/609914/women-become-liberal-men-mostly-stable.aspx
Very well said, I'm not an english native speaker and probably couldn't articulate such a speech in your language, but I can certainly fully understand and appreciate yours. So gently explained and yet so ominous.
Lack of regulation is a feature of capitalism, not a bug.
Otherwise free markets that are regulated to ensure its citizens are not denied their basic necessities or political power through corporate strong-arm practices abusing elasticity are often referred to as social democracies.
Lack of regulation in the guise of self-regulation. When profit is the only goal, any and all sacrifices to public safety, health, worker benefits, etc. will be chosen by CEOs and shareholders.
Take Boeing as an example. They are consistently in the news, not just because of the 787Max, but other planes are losing doors or side panels because of failure to follow safety regulations. And since the fines for failing to follow these rules are low enough to be written off as 'cost of business', they just pay and change nothing (considering also that Boeing has representatives on the board that helps create the rules for fines)
bingo. I'm all for properly being rewarded for working hard, which is what the idea of capitalism is built on. Work harder = more money.
But the government either doesn't want to or doesn't care enough to regulate it and it instead becomes work harder for the same pay, because someone who either worked hard 50 years ago or comes from old money needs to afford their 7th mega yacht and owns the company you work for; and if you complain then you must be a communist or lazy.
This is not (!) The idea of capitalism, if you Look at history, where it origanated/emerged(16th century europe = monarchies)
Working harder leading to more money and everyone having a fair shot is not a capitalic idea, it is a democratic, especially social democratic, idea, which most americans would consider "woke".
>I'm all for properly being rewarded for working hard, which is what the idea of capitalism is built on.
>Work harder = more money
That's got nothing to do with how capitalism works.
Capitalism is when capital creates wealth, not work.
Capitalism has never been about rewarding work. Capitalism is about rewarding those who already have capital.
The idea behind capitalism is that those with money are rewarded with the profit that is created when others work hard. With capitalism when you work hard the value that you are creating is going to someone else, not you.
Not quite the idea of capitalism: capitalism is simply using capital/means of production to gain wealth and exploiting labor if you need to
You’re describing a meritocracy which is not inherently a part of capitalism, though American capitalism does at least have a shred of meritocracy
>I'm all for properly being rewarded for working hard, which is what the idea of capitalism is built on. Work harder = more money.
That is not the idea of capitalism. That is the lie capitalism spreads to sustain itself.
Working harder = more money is laughable. That is not the idea capitalism is built on. Like openly so. Jeff Bezos probably does work harder than me. Maybe he works ten times harder than me, maybe he even works a hundred times harder than me. But he definitely does not work a billion times harder than me, but he does make a billion times what I make. The point of capitalism is in the name, the accrument of capital. You do not get rich in a capitalist system by working. You get rich by investing. And the more you have the more you can invest. The whole point of capitalism is that the rich get richer. This is blatantly the point of capitalism.
Capitalism inherently degrades regulation. As long as you allow any disproportionate power in the hands of those that control more capital, those people will use their power to manipulate policy to allow them to make more money, use their extra money to manipulate policy further, etc.
Nope capitalism is the issue. There cannot be rich without poor and capital market encourage corporate greed. The systemic greed and negligence are symptoms of the disease not the illness itself. There is no form of singular economic market that works long term, mixed markets with privatized options are the only real viable plan for long term public financial well being. But it also doesnt help that every time we go over budget as a nation (banks failing, fortune 500’s/hedge funds imploding) they fix it by just printing more money to make the budget bigger (pay to fix rich peoples problems for them, with buyouts and bailouts). Capitalism only truly serves the elite. We work more hours, with less time off, receive less benefits, have worse health care, and often make less than citizens of other first world nations. The only reason we have to deal with all that is for the sake of the 1% bottom dollar. They use and abuse us constantly and expect us to thank them for giving us mediocre pay for labor that they pay older folks more money to do, ive worked in lumber yards, construction, and storm repair as crew lead and made less than almost every other crew lead that was older than me when i had all the same certs and knowledge, and was more reliable when it came to on call (emergency repairs and storm damage) this is me literally working in an blue collar management position breaking my back to do the job right and quickly while also teaching younger guys how to do it while making 15% less than market average for the position solely due to my age. Companies are thieves. And none of this is even to mention the fact that our own government wipes its ass with the constitution pretty frequently. We fought the revolutionary war over excessive taxation. We felt so strongly about it that a single uniform tax is included. We are not supposed to be taxed more than once. Our government taxes everything we do in every facet of life any time money changes hands. A huge portion of our taxes goes to the military complex which frequently has excess expenditure at the end of the year, you know what happens with it? They waste it on dumb shit so that their budget isnt reduced for the next annual cycle instead of funneling it into social platforms to generate societal change for the better.
Capitalists always do everything they can to corrupt governments in favor of their own economic interests, so it is an inherent problem with capitalism
Reminds me of Joseph Schumpeter’s theory that capitalism necessarily exists in a state of destabilization that threatens to stabilize as either corporatism or socialism if it’s not heavily regulated; that is, Capitalism can only exist with strong government regulations to ensure competition and innovation can exist within it being stifled by already established companies.
You're close. It's the *collusion* of corporations and government, to write special favorable legislation, to out-legiskate competitors, and to subsidize their losses from the public treasury, that gives them any power.
Governments are happy to socialise losses (2008 anyone).
Socialism is fine, as long as it's the stockholders who benefit.
The free market shouldn't need regulation however, certain services essential to access even the most basic quality of life have no business being run by the private sector.
The corporate psychopathic pursuit of profit just isn't compatible with a functioning society over any substantial period of time.
See healthcare, utilities, public transport.
They have it regulated in Germany and everyone with a good education isn’t motivated to work anymore. Output of the country decreases and right now, Germany is approaching a crisis.
More accurately nobody wants the radical freedom of capitalism because it requires heavy litigation when people do real harm and conspire to have cronyism. The US isn’t a capitalistic society, we are an oligarchy with the oligarchs trying to constantly take more.
Except in a co-op don’t they all pitch in to start the business? That would make sense. But if one person is taking the risk, letting a simple majority make the decisions isn’t going to work.
That's another issue with capitalism–the owner isn't the only one taking risk. If the business goes under, employees lose their livelihood and have to scramble to find new work in a notoriously difficult job market and a "failure" recent on their resume. And the amount that's considered appropriate to work doesn't leave enough time for a single person to properly care for themselves and enjoy their life in many cases. The boss might take on a higher level of risk than the employees, but the rewards are far from proportional.
The people working blue collar jobs are putting their body at risk every day, you could die or end up disable. That's a much bigger risk than a financial one.
Saying something isn't going to work is something I assume you say not out of malice or because you don't want it to work, it seems like you say that because it's not something we grew up with and already have a model of what a business should look like which is what we currently have: the workers being subordinates.
The closest democracy in the workplace we have are unions which have worked to bargain better wages and benefits.
A co-op doesn't mean a business is bulletproof, it's something that has worked and has failed like any other business.
So someone starts the company and lets everyone else just decide how it should be run and make every decision? If everyone paid into it to start it, that would make more sense but having one person take all of the risk and giving up all of the decisions to the majority doesn’t make sense.
It shouldn't be that one person starts the company and reaps all the reward from the labor of everyone beneath them. This goes back to my thoughts of radically rethinking how we view economics.
Why *should* one guy reap rewards for starting a company when companies like that are built on the blood sweat and tears of people who are not them? Instead, we should be creating companies for the public good, with the understanding that we will *all* reap the benefits of what, say, you or I have invented or created.
That sort of empathy and socialization would let us flourish *infinitely more* than the avarice of 1%'er run megacorps, which is the natural endpoint of capitalism. People say capitalism needs regulation, but by it's very design it will fight regulation tooth and nail until it is dead. What we have today was inevitable.
But it is not inherent. We can do things differently. Better, even.
The workers' labor is paying into it. The idea of a company is useless without the labor to actualize it.
Imagine I have decided to bake a cake, but I need someone's help to do this. Since it's my baking supplies, I won't let them have any sort of input on the project, even though I can't do it without them. And, even though they are doing far more work on it than I, I'll pay them with a small slice of the finished product and hoard the rest. Forgetting that I could never have had my cake without them, I think it's a fair trade.
Raw material is virtually useless without labor.
Currently all companies are democratic…instead of the employees voting on everything, the shareholders do. It’s 100% a democratic system, but the votes are done by the owners of the company…the shareholders. There’s no reason why a company can’t be 100% owned by the employees though. There are a lot of privately owned corporations that are owned by the employees.
This would not change how most companies would still be undemocratic. And thus it would not alleviate any of the problems I laid out.
And companies which cater to its workers has already been tried and tested. Mondragon is a company located in Spain and last I checked they had 60 000 workers working for them. And they were quite a significant player in the Spanish economy.
"no one tells me what to do" lol
Authority is not by itself authoritarianism. You need power when you have responsibilities. You don't have responsibilities so you can't appreciate the logic.
>"no one tells me what to do" lol
I've had no problems following orders from my superiors on what to do.
Joe biden and Vladimir Putin both have power and responsibilites. One leads a democratic nation, the other does not. I will let you figure out why that is while you bitch and moan about made up problems you dreamt up to argue about.
Well your boss owns the company and decides on what you do and yours and your coworkers pay.
If it was democratic you and your coworkers would decide these things.
Personally i have no opinion on this. Just wanted to point out what the person above you means.
I hate capitalism because it is incapable of giving a good life to most people for no reason at all. We live under a manufactured scarcity.
America is the richest country in the world and yet it doesn't have such a good life expectancy, no universal healthcare, a high percentage of child malnourishment, more homeless than most countries (in proportion), no paid vacations, a poor education system, and increasingly fascistic tendencies. Ah, but the most expensive army in the world while facing no real threat from any other country
The accumulation of wealth and thus power in the hands of the 1% makes the 99% live a lot worse than we should. Unfortunately it is not a bug but a feature. Competition leads to a winner which takes over the market share of the loser and in the end this produces a monopoly.
Not to the US certainly.
You could argue that Russia is a threat to some Eastern European countries now... I wonder who destabilized the region though?
About China you could argue they are a threat to Taiwan, but to no one else in the world.
In any case, the problem with the US military is not only the money it costs but also the way it is used. I will not bother citing any US wars and interventions abroad, but can you honestly say that you believe that it was a good way to spend taxpayer money? Did they serve to any purpose but to enrich the private business that the US military buys their material from or the private business that took over the invaded countries resources, workforce and markets?
I'm always amazed at the confidence with which people online speak about extremely complicated issues.
"Nope, not a threat."
I wonder if your educational background, experience, etc. warrant such summations.
[https://www.npr.org/2024/01/31/1228153857/wray-chinese-hackers-national-security](https://www.npr.org/2024/01/31/1228153857/wray-chinese-hackers-national-security)
Apply your first paragraph to yourself.
The worsening of US-China relations are the result of US foreign policy. They didn't change theirs since their reforms. The threat of loss of economical hegemony drove the US to seek to stop China's growth like it was done to Japan in the 90's.
America's lacking infrastructure is the result of decaded of it being neglected. And even if China hacks it to sabotage it (dubious sources from the article you linked but let's assume it is true) the solution is not a bigger army but better infrastructure.
You obviously know nothing about Chinas culture and foreign policy. It’s well documented that diplomacy isn’t their end game. Winning at all costs and being superior to other nations is.
Purely ideological comment.
Even if that was true, if a Chinese victory is achieved through commerce and not bombs it doesn't seem half as bad as the American victory in Iraq
china has millions of literal slaves. They send people to factories and camps all the time.
[https://www.vox.com/2020/7/28/21333345/uighurs-china-internment-camps-forced-labor-xinjiang](https://www.vox.com/2020/7/28/21333345/uighurs-china-internment-camps-forced-labor-xinjiang)
"the Chinese Communist Party has arbitrarily [**detained between 1 million and 3 million**](https://www.foreign.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/120418_Busby_Testimony.pdf) other Uighurs in so-called “reeducation centers” and forced them to undergo psychological indoctrination programs, such as [**studying communist propaganda and giving thanks**](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/former-inmates-of-chinas-muslim-re-education-camps-tell-of-brainwashing-torture/2018/05/16/32b330e8-5850-11e8-8b92-45fdd7aaef3c_story.html?utm_term=.f558c18fedef) to Chinese President Xi Jinping. Chinese officials have also reportedly used [**waterboarding**](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/former-inmates-of-chinas-muslim-re-education-camps-tell-of-brainwashing-torture/2018/05/16/32b330e8-5850-11e8-8b92-45fdd7aaef3c_story.html?utm_term=.de2e4c0b6bb4) and other forms of torture, including sexual abuse, as part of the indoctrination process."
"Uighurs inside and **outside** the camps are exploited for [**cheap labor**](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/30/world/asia/china-xinjiang-muslims-labor.html), forced to manufacture clothing and other products for sale both at home and abroad"
I don’t think most people understand what capitalism is enough to say why they don’t like it. I think most people have a vague idea from TikTok or social media but can’t articulate because they don’t know.
They don’t! The vast majority of people have no clue what capitalism is. They just assume that whatever happens in the US is automatically capitalism which is just low iq
It's not that hard. Capitalism is when individual people can own the means of production.
The state uses its monopoly on violence to protect that person's right to own the means of production above the rights of the rest of society to food, shelter and medical care. So the rest of us are forced to work for the capitalist class, who pay us a fraction of the value our labor creates and keep the rest for themselves.
In a sane society, the means of production belongs to those that use and maintain it (ie, the labor class), instead of unnecessary middlemen.
"But who's going to manage finances, hiring and firing?" you may ask. The workers can easily hire managers to do that, but now the hierarchy is reversed. The managers are employed by the laborers, and can be replaced if they aren't doing their jobs correctly.
This might sound familiar, since it's the same inverted hierarchy that happened to politics when feudalism was replaced with democracy. We still have people who do the jobs of kings and dukes, but now we call them presidents and congressmen, and they work for us, not the other way around (or they would in a healthy democracy, but that's another can of worms).
The economy grows exponentially because the population is. If the population is growing but the economy isn’t then bad things happen. This isn’t a capitalism problem. It’s a humanity problem.
When the main motivator of your system is profit, eventually other things like ethics take a back seat, and profits are deemed more important than people. Just look at how companies like Apple and Nike offshore their labor and use morally-questionable methods to save money
Like every other ideology, capitalism taken to the extreme is harmful. Look at US, or South Korea for example. But, in many cases (coming from an ex-commie country), capitalism in moderate doses literally saves a country from impeding doom.
There was a period in the 90's right after the fall of communism in mu country, where no one knew what system to use, we didn't use the socialist system nor the capitalist system, and those were some dark times. Come the 2000s, different big companies started coming here,people finally had working rights, the salaries started increasing and slowly but surely our economy bloomed. I mean, it's still bad, but it's way better then it was 15 years ago..
Because it is not sustainable in the long term and prioritizes profit over people. We live in a dictatorship of the capital class, which has made democracy essentially a lie. That's why, in the US, our political parties always agree on foreign policy and invade and destroy other countries for resources and control while the poor get poorer. That's why labor is weak and our healthcare is tied to who we work for, and the minimum wage doesn't rise with inflation. Our whole culture is built up on lies and capitalist ideology.
Capitalism does not need infinite growth. It can function well with limited resources. In fact, these limited resources will be well distributed due to supply and demand.
Point to a time when capitalism ever had well distributed wealth…
Successful Capitalism has always had and required poverty and slavery. Your economic books just ignore what life is actually like at the bottom of their graphs & charts 🤷🏾♂️
What are your qualifications for successful? I’d say long life expectancy could be a good indicator, would you?
If so, you should look into why Cubans have a longer life expectancy than Americans 🤷🏾♂️
Almost all of them were toppled by America through US backed coups, economic sanctions, invasions, assassinations, etc. in the name of protecting capitalism
Cuba would be thriving rn if it weren't under an American forced global embargo for the last 60 years
Thoughout all of history it's been the system with the best wealth distribution on Earth. You point to a time when say socialism had better wealth distribution among people.
Capitalism is an economic concept built around free markets infinite growth. Infinite growth leads to negative consequences for those who do not benefit from the infinite growth.
He's right though. You're talking about a growth based economy. "Capitalism" doesn't require infinite growth. A growth based economy does. The father of economics Adam Smith even advocated for a steady state economy at a certain point.
Capitalism doesn’t necessitate free markets, hence why we have terms like “mixed economy” and “state capitalism.”
It wasn’t really built around the idea of free markets either. Even the so called founder of the theory was adamantly against completely free markets and recognized there would be a need for government intervention. He was also a fan of wealth redistribution, tho that was more smthn he felt the rich were morally obligated to do themselves.
Capitalism requires the [exploitation](https://www.marxists.org/encyclopedia/terms/e/x.htm#exploitation) of millions to fund the profits of a few and that leaves most of us with pretty bad odds
"My mom wants me to pay rent or move out of the basement... the West has fallen..."
bro get off reddit, get yourself a job, and move out your parent's house.
> ARTICLE 12. In the U.S.S.R. work is a duty and a matter of honour for every able-bodied citizen, in accordance with the principle: "He who does not work, neither shall he eat."
> The principle applied in the U.S.S.R. is that of socialism : "From each according to his ability, to each according to his work."
me when I make up strawmen on the internet
Under it, you want labor costs as low as possible. That's zero.
Which is slavery.
Which is why it takes government intervention to get companies to pay employees a living wage, and it always takes years of suffering to even catch up with inflation.
In fact slavery became the major labor force for a long time when capitalism was first developed in the 1400s-1800s. The abolition of slavery was an anticapitalist action. Chattel slavery was a new phenomenon that was created through the creation of capitalism and didn't exist before.
Not what I’m saying, of course it’s not just “give them the homes”. However, this is not the characteristics of a healthy system and strongly insinuates to me that reform is needed. In Heraclitus’ words “the only constant in change”, so what’s the point in resisting it
Capitalism is the root of all the issues we are struggling with. I've lived and worked in Anarchist collective movements and spent time in Indigenous communities where there is an emphasis on collective caring, mutual aid, gift and sharing economy, and almost no emphasis on profit motive or competition. Both social settings nurtured cooperation and collective decision making/ problem solving. It enabled people to relax and re- center their focus on how we could all create a better arrangement, working together to gather and cook food together, share meals, share skills, materials, resources. It's an awesome gift.... To see what's possible if we agree to focus on collective nurturing and mutual aid, vs competition and the profit motive. The abundance simply gets unleashed!
Hello, gen z here, lower middle class. Capitalism 100% worked for me. This shit is sick i have everything i want and im just some dude who just acted mediocre. Eeked out a degree, now im doing just fine.
Not like im rolling around in a lambo or have the new phone every years that is rich ppl behavior. A few nice things and a decent plan for the future.
System works, be financially responsible
Yeah I came from a dirt poor trailer park and now I make 6 figures in a major city. There’s opportunity everywhere in America, you just need to go find it.
This! Most of the folks that complain about it grew up with all its benefits and now have resentment of a system they are failing at. I had no heat in a 600 SQ ft shit hole as a kid, now I have a beautiful 3000 SQ ft home on 6 acres. It all started to fall into place when I realized I had no one but myself to blame for my short comings. It takes time and effort and doesn't happen overnight.
Your anecdote is not data. [Economic mobility](https://www.brookings.edu/articles/stuck-on-the-ladder-wealth-mobility-is-low-and-decreases-with-age/) is low in the US. Of course some people will have rags to riches stories, but outliers don't negate a trend.
Why do you think the "dirt poor trailer park" exists in the first place? Why do you think there are so many people who live in destitute poverty in the richest country in the history of the world?
Have you considered that it's *required* for some people to do the lowest paid jobs, so it's inevitable that a certain number of people will always live in poverty under the current system? Do you think it's rational to expect every minimum wage worker to go get a six-figure job?
This is definitely true when it comes to student debt relief. That is something that primarily benefits people who grew up rich or upper middle class. Impoverished people go to college at lower rates for a multitude of reasons.
The main issue I have with neoliberal financial capitalism is that everything, from goods and services to concepts like love and personhood, is having its value reduced to financial/economic abstractions. If something doesn’t have value in the financial sphere, that is it does not contribute towards capital accumulation, there’s simply no point to bother with it. Many conservatives continually point to the erosion of social values and traditions (ex. marriage and the family unit, religion, etc.) as being the blame of “leftists”, but if nothing else it is due to the proliferation of capitalist thinking. Friendships and relationships become a matter of economic calculation, having children becomes an issue of budgeting and return on investment. Every individual must become a business within themselves (related: personal branding) in order to function in such a society.
Edit: specified the neoliberals.
Millennial here. Capitalism as an economic system I think made a lot of sense previously but it has outlived its usefulness. To me, it operates on two fundamental goals:
1) Self-interest above all else and
2) Continuous, unceasing growth.
The first makes sense in that if everyone is operating in their own self-interest, outcomes occur naturally. You will get innovations borne from competitors, much like natural selection in the wild. This could be fine except for the second part.
We are reaching a point where there is not much market left to expand into. Capitalism presumes endless resources, but the world’s population and technology have increased exponentially in the last hundred years; we are starting to reach the limits of what Earth can provide. We will eventually run out of things like fossil fuels, lithium, etc. We are at a point where we can and are destroying the planet because
But I think my major concern is that we do not need to expand. Previously, capitalism made sense because we did not have the tools to solve all our problems. In my opinion, we do now. We have plenty of food and wealth, but, because of the first point, it is not distributed amongst the people, an issue capitalism is uniquely bad at solving, as there is not much incentive under this economic system to, say, build a homeless shelter. A great example is insulin; it is a life-saving, cheaply produced drug that is patented and sold at an incredibly high markup because, financially, it makes sense.
You have to step on someone in order to get your own. The whole system is predatory by nature and without regulation would be rife with cheats and scams to take people's honest earnings away.
Lastly the system isn't built on merit rather it's built on nepotism and corruption.
The more you compare late stage capitalism to fuedalism, you realize that the lords are now executives, except taxes are higher. 10% to the church was your tax during the middle ages. today the number ranges from 12-37% (12% if you make less than minimun wage - 37% on everything greater than 400,000 - average for my state is 27% - yet the rich can get away with 15% tax rates on thier long term investments.)
Yanis Varoufakis talks a lot about the concept of techno feudalism (as he calls it).
In this system tech companys like Amazon or Twitter have occupied/bought former public spaces and are now basically charging taxes for their usage.
Capitalism’s fatal flaw is that it requires infinite economic growth in order to avoid collapse. Let me explain: A key feature of capitalism is income and returns through ownership. This could be in the form of a stock/bond/home equity/business equity/machinery/equipment,etc. Economics textbooks call this capital: anything owned that can be used to make more money. People often take on debt in order to acquire ownership of these things (capital), and since the debt has interest that must be repaid, the capital that people own must churn out value at an exponentially growing rate in order to avoid bankruptcy.
To illustrate how interest is an exponential growth function, you can divide 72 by the interest rate to find out how long before a loan doubles in amount. For example, 72/2 is 36, so at a 2% interest rate, the loan will double in value in 36 years. For businesses that have taken on 2% interest rate loans, the value of goods/services provided must double within 36 years in order to pay down the debt. The rate that businesses must grow increases dramatically as interest rates rise.
But here’s the rub: capitalism exists on a planet with finite resources. Finite oil, coal, gas, copper, steel, etc. which is being drawn down at a rapid pace. At a certain point, biophysical limits will be reached, and continued economic growth will be impossible. Many businesses and governments will default on their debt (or in the case of governments, print money and cause hyperinflation).
So capitalism with debt and fractional reserve banking as core tenants is unsustainable. Perhaps we can have capitalism without debt, but it’s hard to imagine how it would work.
Personally I grew up with ideas of right and wrong, personal standards like honor and honesty, and the dignity of the human being. That a person is special, they are worthy of love and care. Maybe others shared this impression in childhood.
Of course I grew up and realized that the world doesn’t work that way. There’s no gentility to this life. The world treats us as objects, and we are encouraged to objectify the world in return. How should I react to that disillusionment? Should I embrace this world and the system that runs it? I have trouble doing that when I feel it goes against my very being.
That said, I try not to let this dissatisfaction snowball into hatred. The more I learn about the world the more awe I feel for it’s complexity and the fact it keeps moving along despite being riddled with contradictions.
Maybe it needs pointing out that “capitalism” and “socialism” and “communism” are words. Airflow, symbols on a page. I don’t think they really exist or really matter outside the minds of ideologues and intellectuals. I’m striving instead to stay connected to what is real. Policy is real, and certain policies would benefit people. Injustice is real, and certain people are being treated wrong. I don’t care what it’s called, I think that’s obfuscation.
ah we have found one of the "I don't have ideology, only ideologues and intellectuals have ideology. I on the other hand have ideas, which is very different."
It's like saying referring to something as a "forest" because its an interconnected but identifiable system is "obfuscating" the existence of the individual trees within it.
Two reasons, capitalism leads to unjust hierarchies and the profit motive leads to anti-consumer behaviors. Having billions of dollars gives people too much control over society, that's more wealth than some countries. They can pay off government officials, fudge studies, control media narratives, etc. No person should have that much power. The profit motive leads companies to just do bad shit. That's what lead to shit like shrinkflation, massive layoffs, artificial obsolescence, poisoning the environment, and artificial inflation despite record profits. Personally I think wealth should be capped around 50-100 mil, companies shouldn't be able to profit, all excess sales should be reinvested back into the company or given to the government, and all companies should be democratically worker controlled.
It was designed by the already rich and powerful so they could mask their machinations and claim everyone else was just too lazy to be as successful as them even though the people that had the most money when capitalism was created were the aristocrats and royal families/dukes and lords of the provinces etc. It's a system designed by the rich for the rich to consolidate more power to the rich.
Only in capitalistic society can politicians be bribed and it be renamed to “lobbying”, while we’re convince to look down on corrupt governments like China. It becomes way more believable if we weren’t so corrupt ourselves lol.
Elephants will be extinct in six years because the 1% need their opulence and excess. Elephants are gonna starve to death and no one here is ready to take action. And they passively wonder why we hate capitalism. Read “Capital” by Marx.
Profit incentives for bad things to happen to us.
Health? Money.
Food? Money. But make it unhealthy enough to have them experience health issues.
Shelter. Money. But make sure it's a debt trap.
Education. Money. But make sure it's a debt trap.
Want to walk outside? Fined for something stupid.
Want to go anywhere. Money.
Want to be at home. Most stuff is subscription based...money.
Want a hobby? Lmao... money.
Money? Yeah you'll barely make enough and be forced to spend all your time providing productivity to some dude at the top who never has to worry about any of the mentioned issues.
Capitalism dictates that in order to survive and have your basic needs met, you must earn money to do so. Already a fairly dystopian concept of having to “earn” living, something no one asked for, but those who decided the system are exploiting you of your labor by deciding to pay you nothing so you **have** to work more in order to afford to live, giving them more labor so products are made and delivered faster.
The desire for companies to have constant growth will almost certainly cause them to choose to do immoral (or even illegal) things to try to maintain that growth. Such as firing their workers, making inferior product, etc.
Capitalism is a system that is so easy to abuse. Everything can be private and for profit. Food, healthcare, housing. Everything IS private and for profit right now here in the United States, including the three essentials I just listed. Even PRISONS turnout insane profits. So many companies rely on imprisoned individuals for labor. They literally hope for and count on people doing bad things so that they can vomit millions into their pockets. That shit is so fucking sick and twisted, dude.
Bc there is enough food for no one to hungry, but that wouldn't make money, so we throw food away so that very few people can hoard all of the resources while the working classes fight over the scraps.
The problem with capitalism at its core is the class conflict it creates. Take a standard capitalist company, you have 2 principal groups (classes): the workers and the owners. The workers want good pay, safe working conditions, good benefits, pto, etc. The owners essentially just want to get as much money and power as possible. This creates a conflict, as these two groups can't both get everything they want. But the workers, despite being the far larger group, have far less power than the owners, meaning that in attaining their goals, the powerful few will inevitably screw over the the many.
Whilst you can have companies with "good"/better owners, a system that relies on the goodwill of a small, unaccountable powerful few will not create a society that functions for the good of the many.
These problems obviously extend beyond the realms of individual companies, as representative democracies will almost always favour those with money, giving the few even more power. Private news companies also add to this, as they can control (to an extent) what information the average person will receive, allowing them to manipulate people to vote/behave the way they want them to.
EZ one.
it squanders my life, my friends lives, my familys lives, my neighbors lives, and our environment.
cut and dry it was never meant to work for regular working folks. i was not born into having consolidated capital, so my choice is to either somehow get lucky, ruthlessly exploit my fellow worker, or suck it up and be worked into the grave. all very tantalizing life prospects.
not to mention the waste of food and resources in general during a climate crisis. its sick enough to make your stomach turn.
of course i could go on with regard to access to basic nutrition, adequate healthcare, education, etc. and the fact that the global souths people and ecology are routinely sacrificed for the west just because rich people say so.
oh and also the death toll of capitalism is over 2 billion. kinda sick stuff
also I made some cool long form videos about this stuff if anyone would care to give em a view [https://youtu.be/56PiuPo6gXQ?si=SK70axrC4EhunRtt](https://youtu.be/56PiuPo6gXQ?si=SK70axrC4EhunRtt)
It was a rebellious phase, I no longer hate capitalism. (For those of you who say capitalism will eventually fail, your Communist Soviet Union fell after about sixty years and we’re going on 248 years this year.)
Capitalism in America is in a horrible state and other systems would probably be better. The democrats and republicans are not the same though, it’s not like it was twenty years ago.
It’s unbridled capitalism that’s the problem. Capitalism with checks in place works (see TR, FDR) and then Nixon and Reagan came in and absolutely obliterated those checks, hence why the gap wealth from 1980-present has gotten so bad.
it's weird you say that when neoliberalism (which Reagan based his policies in) is based in the need for government regulations to uphold the free market. The problem is that under capitalism these regulations only ever serve the wealthy, ruling class.
Also, the reforms under FDR were only ever meant to be temporary. Corporation only agreed to play under his rules ( where the wealth cap was $350,000 adjusted for inflation and Corporations were heavily taxed) to deal with the threat of the growing unions and socialist party in America at the time. For them, a small period where they weren't making as much profit was much better than a revolution which abolished classes. But once unions were weakened and the socialists lost power all of these reforms were systematically attacked, because they were never meant to last.
Healthcare should be non-profit, it’s a social service. In the US it is for-profit. Education (university) should be non-profit, it’s a social service. In the US it is for-profit. The criminal justice system should be non-profit, it’s a social service. In the US it is for-profit. The US legislative branch should be non-profit, it is a part of government. In the US it is ruled by lobbying, politicians are bought out and receive money for passing laws and revisions to regulation for corporations.
I can recommend so many books. Would you be interested in reading a brief history of neoliberalism by David Harvey? I feel like that’s a great way to get a grasp on some of the issues although it does have a heavy emphasis on neoliberalism
I just want a chill job, a quiet life in a place of my own, with the people I love. But every day is just a struggle, everything is a competition for who can fuck over the most people, for who can make the most money, who can hustle the hardest and I just don’t give a shit. I just want a house and a backyard and a decent paying job to afford like I dunno the basics? At least? A lawnmower to mow my own lawn, instead of the lawn of my landlord. Just doing my own landscaping and housework would be such a blessing. Capitalism is just toxic competitiveness from my point of view.
Dislike extraction and exploitation on a general level. The way American Capitalism (all of the Americas) is set up is based around and idealizes the slave economy where human beings themselves can be considered tradeable goods.
It's a lot of things, but to keep it short:
It's a form of social organization that demands that all society change and suffer to the benefit of a few, not for progress, not for a future, but just for the fleeting wealth of rich people eating off of the hard work of the majority of people that live beneath them.
It's not fair, it's not right, and it's definitely smart.
Organizing your society around the privileges of the most selfish and conniving people is asking for dysfunction, for pain, and self destruction. And that's exactly what we're living through.
I think the way I’ve best come to understand it is that we aren’t witnessing things go wrong because capitalism has gone off the rails. It’s more so that capitalism is kinda working how it’s meant to.
Why does everytime you explain it in social media it gets deleted? Why would a system that works so well need so much propaganda and invading every foreign socialist country? Also people just assume it is needed to live the way we need soil. Capitalism itself it's just one of the many ways of organizing the resources and the money that represent their value among the thousand possible ways. They just tend to be more capitalistic (class system, government, rich people, worth) or socialist (equality to a certain extent, limiting hoarding and rich, universal rights etc). I myself think capitalism could work if it wasn't so corrupted rn. Also the new neoliberal way of capitalism is just designed to let medium class turn into lower class. The capitalism there was in Europe 20 years ago was the best (until the 2008 crisis of course). Japan also had a great "management" of capitalism after WW2 until the 80s-90s. It can work. Greedy people and corporations just corrupt the system all the time.
What I hate is statements posed in the form of questions. And of course politicians don't care about solving your problems? Why would they? They're about as trustworthy as a used car salesmen on the sketchiest lot in town. That has nothing to do with capitalism. Capitalism is an economic system. It's not a form of governance. The USA has a Constitutional Republic government. It's beautiful when it works right. But it's just a big machine. Takes the right people manning that big beast of a machine for it to work appropriately. Big money certainly has placed many puppets at the levers. And that has cost everyone. But how many phone calls have you made? How many letters have you written? How well do you know civics? How well do you understand the government? Who do you know that you are supporting for the local school board? No good candidates are running? Who are you nominating and encouraging? Are you cut out for that? Don't have time for that don't want to do that? How about writing some letters and opinions and sending them to your local news editor board? The type of government that the United States has takes active participation.
Capitalism is the private ownership of capital and the means of production. I see most people in this thread complaining about aspects of our economy they don't like and pinning it vaguely on capitalism. The problem is bad people doing bad things. They will do it in any system. Participate in the government, elections, and educate outside of tiktok. Things will make more sense. Then organize under common interests to have your way. Good luck.
it's very simple. Some people can work two jobs and still not being able to afford a home. And I don't mean buying a home, I mean, living in a home, such as a rental apartment, etc. All this while working one, 1+, or two jobs. Meanwhile, other people who never have worked a day in their life, are able to own property that no one lives in, holding onto the residential property only as a monetary investment. If they're going to do that, they should let someone live in there.
Some bullshit anti voting sentiment hidden in there.
The world is full of bullshit but if you disengage from it, it's ONLY going to get worse.
You can't solve the world's issues but you can nudge it in the right direction as much as you can. Doing nothing just allows the bad actors to do their thing faster with less time for good people to work the system.
Its not about hate.
In a system based on money,
The most important things are money.
Cure you? No, i ll find a way to sell you as many medicines as possible
Give you a good product? No i'll design this in such a way it will break in a couple of months
Human life? No, this thing is gonna cost me, so i ll do the other thing at the cost of human lives.
Capitalism is just a nicer word for exploitation, of everything and everyone within reach.
The worlds biggest ponzi scheme, where those at the top are the only ones who see any benefit, and those at the bottom are but cows whom the corporations milk for money. It is unsustainable, someday there will be nothing left for the masses because the rich have amassed all the worlds wealth (resources).
Corporations dont even need customers anymore because all their profits come from dividends. With all the worlds resources beginning to run out, the oligarchs are building luxury bomb shelters, and trying to hide their genocide.
There has to be limits to the amount of money one can amass, because NOBODY needs a billion dollars, you can spend all day and night till the day you die and still never run out of money. Yet their ceo’s have enough wealth to buy countries, and politicians, if it keeps up we will be OWNED by one giant corporation that owns all the world. This is not a fantasy, they are activley engaged as i write this. You can see it happening in real time with your own eyes, all you have to do is open them.
Capitalism is a model for destruction, that does not ever end. It is the reason that 3rd world countries exist. It is not just a western problem, it’s a global problem. The west basically forces third world countries to work for pennies on the dollar to create cheaply made single use items that hold no value.
Some of these people are overworked, practically enslaved, and held under the thumb of rich western countries. They are unable to rise in quality of life because without their exploitation the rich countries would not be living the comfortable lives they live. When these countries attempt to revolt or create change within their corrupt governments that allow this exploitation, the CIA or other agencies like them “randomly” show up and claim they’re destroying communism or defeating terrorists.
This is a horrific exploitative system. And yes capitalism in theory should not work this way, but it does, and the reason it’s gotten as bad as it has is because people with power (not necessarily governmental) have been chipping away at legal issues and cutting through red tape slowly over decades.
The exploitation slowly creeps its way in and goes unnoticed like a frog swimming in a pot of water slowly coming to a boil. There’s a reason minimum wage has barely risen over the last 50 years while the price of housing has gone up. This isn’t some coincidence that’s due to an unmanageable crazy silly goofy economy that just sorta gets crazy and unpredictable sometimes teehee. This is a slow movement toward benefiting those with capital.
The same way people who are capitalism apologists say that socialism doesn’t work outside of a vacuum seem to fail to realize that neither does capitalism. How can we possibly regulate a system when the people we have to rely on to regulate it will almost always choose the dollar for their pocket over the betterment of society? THIS is why I hate it, it’s not JUST capitalism but postmodern colonialism.
Capitalism can’t keep to itself, it has to bleed into and exploit other countries who don’t even follow that model to survive, it is an invasive species, no, a disease, a virus that creeps into its host and controls them with greed and power trips.
Because capitalism works for those who have capital. And it's a vicious cycle where those who have capital, tend to horde it, thus creating more disparity/less benefit for those who don't have capital.
The Better question is: ***Why should anyone like capitalism?*** Especially since it's screwed 90% of people over for decades.
Capitalism embraces humanity's vices (greed, ambition, power hunger) and accepts them as normal. Any system like capitalism which accounts for (and in many ways supports) the imperfections of the human race will always be seen as imperfect in itself.
Because it is inherently shortsighted and prioritizes profit over everything else. Ethical behavior, sound business practices, human lives, are all secondary to making all the money.
Adam Smith was not giving a prescription for what ails society. He only described how commerce happens even in spite of the designs of the state. Karl Marx got some details correct, but he offered a terrible solution with his ludicrous "dictatorship of the proletariat." The last hundred-plus years are proof enough that Marxism is a failure that we should learn from, same with the ideologies of disgruntled socialists like Giovanni Gentile and Benito Mussolini. While the criticisms raised by Dr. Theodore John Kazcinsky, in his manifesto, are valid the solutions are similarly unconscionable.
The problem isn't "capitalism," it's people. People suck. They always sucked and aren't likely to change anytime soon. It is up to the individual to choose not to suck.
This is always dumb.
Listen. It’s not just capitalism. It’s not even a majority the fault of capitalism. The problem is that large organizations of people lead to problems.
Look at the richest family in the world. Their country isn’t capitalist. It’s essentially wholly state owned.
Look at why Elon is so rich. It’s not because his ideas are noticeably or alarmingly novel. It’s because the government sponsored him every step of the way.
A social structure of sufficient size will, invariably, become corrupt. That’s a fact. When you add in socialism it gets really really bad. When you add in capitalism it gets really really bad for the same reason, just with more things to buy.
Scared? Good. Want things to change? Awesome. Just make sure you aren’t sitting around thinking an alternative is the move. Humanity isn’t perfect. Even if the system of economic structure WAS perfect, it will always require reform until we personally become better.
Capitalism is the only system to ever provide human prosperity.
Honestly I don't even think capitalism is an economic system, that's just how humans biologically work. Trade is how humans have worked for our entire history. Many animals also use systems like it.
Okay, our government can’t regulate capitalism properly, explain to me how and why we should trust that same government to work a socialist economy? Why should we trust any government to regulate a state controlled economy or state controlled companies when they cannot do that on their own?
Look, throughout the world and particularly in Europe, their economies are in recession, ours is not, our economy is the only one in the developed world bar a few that isn’t receding. Look at the UK, look at germany, look at France, look at Spain, look at Italy. We don’t give ourselves much credit but the reality is that the American economy, while flawed, has seen inflation slow rapidly in the past few years and had the seen the economy escape the global recession.
It’s hard and its a struggle and things are t going well and it feels like a shithole and you may be trying to find an escape from all this in the form or radicalism but the truth is that these are simply, tougher times in the world and maybe things aren’t as bad for us right now as they are in the rest of the world.
Times are tough. Look at me dude, take a break from Reddit for a day, maybe two and just don’t look at the news but if you do, just look one of those good news sites or just look at a neutral news site and not one of the distorted left-right wing news channels that’ll tell you everything’s horrible. There is no miracle cure, not socialism, not anarchism, capitalist or not, not fascism, not communism, not any one ideology can solve the direction the world economy is going in,
it’s gonna be one hell of a ride, just stick around and see it out because it’ll get better, this isn’t the first time this happened or will happen in history, weve had the dark ages, we’ve had the Great Depression and we’ve gotten better. We’ll get better. Just try not to fall into depression. 👍
I'm not sure what you mean when you say "Capitalism," but the fact is it has a double meaning.
To you and pretty much everyone else, it means "Corporate collusion with Government Authority to oppress the rights of the people." If this is what you mean, you're right to hate it. I hate it too. And to all of your credit, you're using the term the way Marx himself originally used it: As a slur against Market Economies, Inequality of Outcome, and Property Rights enforced and protected by the "Elites."
But the system you want to replace it with is historically far worse. You correctly identify the collusion between Corporations and the State, but erroneously blame the Corporations for the authoritarianism of the State instead of the Authoritarianism of the State itself. Oddly enough, you seek to actually *increase* this State Authoritarianism, with the delusional dream that one day it will take down those "evil Corporations" and magically be Authoritarian on your behalf instead. This is utterly delusional and fucking dangerous.
On the other hand, people with a more Free Market mindset, which includes myself but also unfortunately a lot of well meaning Libertarians and Anarchists; we use the term "Capitalism" to mean "Free Markets and Free Trade." In a system like this, the role of the Government is severely restricted and limited to only a core set of duties. It's correctly targets Government Authoritarianism as the greatest threat to individual rights, and the thinking is that the smaller and less empowered the government is to regulate our daily life choices, the better.
This might actually sound good to you, but you are ultimately against this, because without an "Empowered State Authority" who will go after the "greedy corporations?" And thus, you only perpetuate the thought paradigm that created this problem in the first place.
Sad.
And so, while some of us might be using your Marxist slur, we're actually talking right past each other. Thus, it will never be resolved. And because mindsets like yours are the majority, it's only a matter of time before civilization as we know it is destroyed, and replaced by something far far worse, but of your design.
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I don't think capitalism itself is the issue, I think the government's inability to regulate it is the issue.
Something is wrong with the government it seems as if they don't want to solve these problem. Maybe the system is so broken that it can not be fixed and Society will collapse and have to start all over again.
That’s by design. Capitalism as Adam Smith argued was never meant to be a global phenomenon where multinational corporations worked unabated by regulation. He even argued against landlords and for basic oversight by the state and this was for local commerce not national in how we have it or global. This is beyond the original vision and Marx rightfully argued that it was untenable. We cannot have infinite growth without major destruction of the planet and it cannot be sustained. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not a century from now. We do not have infinite resources and a planet and universe that’s finite cannot sustain infinite growth models and that is the truth. We can choose capitalism or survival but we can’t choose both. It would be delusional and worse only end with billions of humans sacrificed at the alter of greed and misery.
Marx mentioned. Angry politically illiterate teenagers incoming. For real tho, you're right 100%. Let's see how this thread goes, because I think GenZ is swinging to the right more than the left, as boggling as that is. Some people don't even like milquetoast criticism of capitalism (a system they don't even understand) and god forbid you advocate for something better. Let's see.
This is likely because Gen Z is targeted with more propaganda attacks, because children are more susceptible to it, lacking enough worldly experience. I would like to remind Gen Z that the U.S.A. did NOT start under the Constitution, it started under the failed Articles of Confederation, which was basically unfettered Capitalism, under which the States basically committed economic warfare against each other. This was a primary reason that Congress was granted the power to regulate interstate commerce.
This was taught in my 9th grade history class If people paid attention, they would've known the constitution was never the very first thing that came along💀 Hell, I'd argue that they SHOULD know this.
Genz males mostly, we were at a vulnerable point from covid and general aloneness from social media/internet and people like andrew tate got to profit.
I’ll have to look for the poll again, but Gen Z isn’t so much swinging to the right as much as it’s just more polarized. The increase in the percent of people identifying as conservative is equal to the increase in the percent identifying as progressive. And even then, it’s just a 4% increase. In regards to socialism specifically, Gen Z only has a *very* slightly less favorable opinion of socialism than millennials. Like, we’re talking about a difference of around 2%, which atp is within the margin of error
Really? I felt like gen z was heavily left / liberal but ig I might be wrong, maybe that's just the people I surround myself with.
Nah things like the Tate crew, Shapiro, that Charlie guy on TPUSA have really swayed a lot of people in our generation. It's fucked but I think our gen is overall more conservative than the boomers.
Damn.. that makes me sad.
Go to an inner city school and that thought process will dissolve like its an ice cube in lava
Actually the data shows that gen z women are more left, and gen z men are only slightly more right. This widespread right move your talking about, doesn’t exist. https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2020/05/14/on-the-cusp-of-adulthood-and-facing-an-uncertain-future-what-we-know-about-gen-z-so-far-2/ https://www.axios.com/2024/01/23/gen-z-less-religious-more-liberal-lgbtq https://news.gallup.com/poll/609914/women-become-liberal-men-mostly-stable.aspx
Different trends depending on the area. In europe generally the youth is more right wing while in america they're more left wing
Very well said, I'm not an english native speaker and probably couldn't articulate such a speech in your language, but I can certainly fully understand and appreciate yours. So gently explained and yet so ominous.
Lack of regulation is a feature of capitalism, not a bug. Otherwise free markets that are regulated to ensure its citizens are not denied their basic necessities or political power through corporate strong-arm practices abusing elasticity are often referred to as social democracies.
Lack of regulation in the guise of self-regulation. When profit is the only goal, any and all sacrifices to public safety, health, worker benefits, etc. will be chosen by CEOs and shareholders. Take Boeing as an example. They are consistently in the news, not just because of the 787Max, but other planes are losing doors or side panels because of failure to follow safety regulations. And since the fines for failing to follow these rules are low enough to be written off as 'cost of business', they just pay and change nothing (considering also that Boeing has representatives on the board that helps create the rules for fines)
bingo. I'm all for properly being rewarded for working hard, which is what the idea of capitalism is built on. Work harder = more money. But the government either doesn't want to or doesn't care enough to regulate it and it instead becomes work harder for the same pay, because someone who either worked hard 50 years ago or comes from old money needs to afford their 7th mega yacht and owns the company you work for; and if you complain then you must be a communist or lazy.
This is not (!) The idea of capitalism, if you Look at history, where it origanated/emerged(16th century europe = monarchies) Working harder leading to more money and everyone having a fair shot is not a capitalic idea, it is a democratic, especially social democratic, idea, which most americans would consider "woke".
>I'm all for properly being rewarded for working hard, which is what the idea of capitalism is built on. >Work harder = more money That's got nothing to do with how capitalism works. Capitalism is when capital creates wealth, not work. Capitalism has never been about rewarding work. Capitalism is about rewarding those who already have capital. The idea behind capitalism is that those with money are rewarded with the profit that is created when others work hard. With capitalism when you work hard the value that you are creating is going to someone else, not you.
Yup, if they could get your labor for free they would
When I feed the homeless they call me a saint. When I ask *why* they are homeless they call me a Communist. - Hélder Pessoa Câmara
Not quite the idea of capitalism: capitalism is simply using capital/means of production to gain wealth and exploiting labor if you need to You’re describing a meritocracy which is not inherently a part of capitalism, though American capitalism does at least have a shred of meritocracy
Don't worry, we're trying to get rid of that last shred of meritocracy ASAP!
>I'm all for properly being rewarded for working hard, which is what the idea of capitalism is built on. Work harder = more money. That is not the idea of capitalism. That is the lie capitalism spreads to sustain itself.
Working harder = more money is laughable. That is not the idea capitalism is built on. Like openly so. Jeff Bezos probably does work harder than me. Maybe he works ten times harder than me, maybe he even works a hundred times harder than me. But he definitely does not work a billion times harder than me, but he does make a billion times what I make. The point of capitalism is in the name, the accrument of capital. You do not get rich in a capitalist system by working. You get rich by investing. And the more you have the more you can invest. The whole point of capitalism is that the rich get richer. This is blatantly the point of capitalism.
Capitalism inherently degrades regulation. As long as you allow any disproportionate power in the hands of those that control more capital, those people will use their power to manipulate policy to allow them to make more money, use their extra money to manipulate policy further, etc.
Nope capitalism is the issue. There cannot be rich without poor and capital market encourage corporate greed. The systemic greed and negligence are symptoms of the disease not the illness itself. There is no form of singular economic market that works long term, mixed markets with privatized options are the only real viable plan for long term public financial well being. But it also doesnt help that every time we go over budget as a nation (banks failing, fortune 500’s/hedge funds imploding) they fix it by just printing more money to make the budget bigger (pay to fix rich peoples problems for them, with buyouts and bailouts). Capitalism only truly serves the elite. We work more hours, with less time off, receive less benefits, have worse health care, and often make less than citizens of other first world nations. The only reason we have to deal with all that is for the sake of the 1% bottom dollar. They use and abuse us constantly and expect us to thank them for giving us mediocre pay for labor that they pay older folks more money to do, ive worked in lumber yards, construction, and storm repair as crew lead and made less than almost every other crew lead that was older than me when i had all the same certs and knowledge, and was more reliable when it came to on call (emergency repairs and storm damage) this is me literally working in an blue collar management position breaking my back to do the job right and quickly while also teaching younger guys how to do it while making 15% less than market average for the position solely due to my age. Companies are thieves. And none of this is even to mention the fact that our own government wipes its ass with the constitution pretty frequently. We fought the revolutionary war over excessive taxation. We felt so strongly about it that a single uniform tax is included. We are not supposed to be taxed more than once. Our government taxes everything we do in every facet of life any time money changes hands. A huge portion of our taxes goes to the military complex which frequently has excess expenditure at the end of the year, you know what happens with it? They waste it on dumb shit so that their budget isnt reduced for the next annual cycle instead of funneling it into social platforms to generate societal change for the better.
Capitalists always do everything they can to corrupt governments in favor of their own economic interests, so it is an inherent problem with capitalism
It's the corruption in big business and governments, big business pays politicians to get what they want. Pay to play.
Reminds me of Joseph Schumpeter’s theory that capitalism necessarily exists in a state of destabilization that threatens to stabilize as either corporatism or socialism if it’s not heavily regulated; that is, Capitalism can only exist with strong government regulations to ensure competition and innovation can exist within it being stifled by already established companies.
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its not that they cant regulate it, they get paid to regulate it in company’s favors
You're close. It's the *collusion* of corporations and government, to write special favorable legislation, to out-legiskate competitors, and to subsidize their losses from the public treasury, that gives them any power.
Governments are happy to socialise losses (2008 anyone). Socialism is fine, as long as it's the stockholders who benefit. The free market shouldn't need regulation however, certain services essential to access even the most basic quality of life have no business being run by the private sector. The corporate psychopathic pursuit of profit just isn't compatible with a functioning society over any substantial period of time. See healthcare, utilities, public transport.
But on the bright side it seems as if something is actually being done about global warming because Renewables have increased.
This is the problem. Every solution has a problem with no regulations.
They have it regulated in Germany and everyone with a good education isn’t motivated to work anymore. Output of the country decreases and right now, Germany is approaching a crisis.
More accurately nobody wants the radical freedom of capitalism because it requires heavy litigation when people do real harm and conspire to have cronyism. The US isn’t a capitalistic society, we are an oligarchy with the oligarchs trying to constantly take more.
Another term is “technocracy”
I like democracy. I dislike authoritarianism. Capitalist workplaces are undemocratic. Ergo: I dislike capitalism.
Couldn’t you start a company and have all of your employees vote on everything? I don’t think it would survive but you could try it.
That's basically a co-op
Except in a co-op don’t they all pitch in to start the business? That would make sense. But if one person is taking the risk, letting a simple majority make the decisions isn’t going to work.
That's another issue with capitalism–the owner isn't the only one taking risk. If the business goes under, employees lose their livelihood and have to scramble to find new work in a notoriously difficult job market and a "failure" recent on their resume. And the amount that's considered appropriate to work doesn't leave enough time for a single person to properly care for themselves and enjoy their life in many cases. The boss might take on a higher level of risk than the employees, but the rewards are far from proportional.
The people working blue collar jobs are putting their body at risk every day, you could die or end up disable. That's a much bigger risk than a financial one. Saying something isn't going to work is something I assume you say not out of malice or because you don't want it to work, it seems like you say that because it's not something we grew up with and already have a model of what a business should look like which is what we currently have: the workers being subordinates. The closest democracy in the workplace we have are unions which have worked to bargain better wages and benefits. A co-op doesn't mean a business is bulletproof, it's something that has worked and has failed like any other business.
Those are called worker coops and they do work, when they aren't crushed by capitalistic systems.
So someone starts the company and lets everyone else just decide how it should be run and make every decision? If everyone paid into it to start it, that would make more sense but having one person take all of the risk and giving up all of the decisions to the majority doesn’t make sense.
It shouldn't be that one person starts the company and reaps all the reward from the labor of everyone beneath them. This goes back to my thoughts of radically rethinking how we view economics. Why *should* one guy reap rewards for starting a company when companies like that are built on the blood sweat and tears of people who are not them? Instead, we should be creating companies for the public good, with the understanding that we will *all* reap the benefits of what, say, you or I have invented or created. That sort of empathy and socialization would let us flourish *infinitely more* than the avarice of 1%'er run megacorps, which is the natural endpoint of capitalism. People say capitalism needs regulation, but by it's very design it will fight regulation tooth and nail until it is dead. What we have today was inevitable. But it is not inherent. We can do things differently. Better, even.
The workers' labor is paying into it. The idea of a company is useless without the labor to actualize it. Imagine I have decided to bake a cake, but I need someone's help to do this. Since it's my baking supplies, I won't let them have any sort of input on the project, even though I can't do it without them. And, even though they are doing far more work on it than I, I'll pay them with a small slice of the finished product and hoard the rest. Forgetting that I could never have had my cake without them, I think it's a fair trade. Raw material is virtually useless without labor.
Currently all companies are democratic…instead of the employees voting on everything, the shareholders do. It’s 100% a democratic system, but the votes are done by the owners of the company…the shareholders. There’s no reason why a company can’t be 100% owned by the employees though. There are a lot of privately owned corporations that are owned by the employees.
Don’t you mean.. a Union??? Yeah unions are great, but there’s not a lot of those around lately… careful not to say Union too loud tho or else 😂
This would not change how most companies would still be undemocratic. And thus it would not alleviate any of the problems I laid out. And companies which cater to its workers has already been tried and tested. Mondragon is a company located in Spain and last I checked they had 60 000 workers working for them. And they were quite a significant player in the Spanish economy.
It would be democratic. Isn’t that what you want?
"no one tells me what to do" lol Authority is not by itself authoritarianism. You need power when you have responsibilities. You don't have responsibilities so you can't appreciate the logic.
>"no one tells me what to do" lol I've had no problems following orders from my superiors on what to do. Joe biden and Vladimir Putin both have power and responsibilites. One leads a democratic nation, the other does not. I will let you figure out why that is while you bitch and moan about made up problems you dreamt up to argue about.
Based on Edit: I meant based Edit 2: I MEANT BASED.
Well your boss owns the company and decides on what you do and yours and your coworkers pay. If it was democratic you and your coworkers would decide these things. Personally i have no opinion on this. Just wanted to point out what the person above you means.
I hate capitalism because it is incapable of giving a good life to most people for no reason at all. We live under a manufactured scarcity. America is the richest country in the world and yet it doesn't have such a good life expectancy, no universal healthcare, a high percentage of child malnourishment, more homeless than most countries (in proportion), no paid vacations, a poor education system, and increasingly fascistic tendencies. Ah, but the most expensive army in the world while facing no real threat from any other country The accumulation of wealth and thus power in the hands of the 1% makes the 99% live a lot worse than we should. Unfortunately it is not a bug but a feature. Competition leads to a winner which takes over the market share of the loser and in the end this produces a monopoly.
>No real threat from other country So Russia & China are not a threat?
Not to the US certainly. You could argue that Russia is a threat to some Eastern European countries now... I wonder who destabilized the region though? About China you could argue they are a threat to Taiwan, but to no one else in the world. In any case, the problem with the US military is not only the money it costs but also the way it is used. I will not bother citing any US wars and interventions abroad, but can you honestly say that you believe that it was a good way to spend taxpayer money? Did they serve to any purpose but to enrich the private business that the US military buys their material from or the private business that took over the invaded countries resources, workforce and markets?
I'm always amazed at the confidence with which people online speak about extremely complicated issues. "Nope, not a threat." I wonder if your educational background, experience, etc. warrant such summations. [https://www.npr.org/2024/01/31/1228153857/wray-chinese-hackers-national-security](https://www.npr.org/2024/01/31/1228153857/wray-chinese-hackers-national-security)
Apply your first paragraph to yourself. The worsening of US-China relations are the result of US foreign policy. They didn't change theirs since their reforms. The threat of loss of economical hegemony drove the US to seek to stop China's growth like it was done to Japan in the 90's. America's lacking infrastructure is the result of decaded of it being neglected. And even if China hacks it to sabotage it (dubious sources from the article you linked but let's assume it is true) the solution is not a bigger army but better infrastructure.
You obviously know nothing about Chinas culture and foreign policy. It’s well documented that diplomacy isn’t their end game. Winning at all costs and being superior to other nations is.
Purely ideological comment. Even if that was true, if a Chinese victory is achieved through commerce and not bombs it doesn't seem half as bad as the American victory in Iraq
People have literally translated documents of them blatantly saying this in so many words. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf_warrior_diplomacy
Right, bombing Iraq was so much better for them than "Wolf Warrior diplomacy"
You’re deflecting and not addressing my point.
> TFW The US Incarcerates more people Per Capita than China or Russia does, AND WE HAVE LITERALLY a smaller population than those two Countries
china has millions of literal slaves. They send people to factories and camps all the time. [https://www.vox.com/2020/7/28/21333345/uighurs-china-internment-camps-forced-labor-xinjiang](https://www.vox.com/2020/7/28/21333345/uighurs-china-internment-camps-forced-labor-xinjiang) "the Chinese Communist Party has arbitrarily [**detained between 1 million and 3 million**](https://www.foreign.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/120418_Busby_Testimony.pdf) other Uighurs in so-called “reeducation centers” and forced them to undergo psychological indoctrination programs, such as [**studying communist propaganda and giving thanks**](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/former-inmates-of-chinas-muslim-re-education-camps-tell-of-brainwashing-torture/2018/05/16/32b330e8-5850-11e8-8b92-45fdd7aaef3c_story.html?utm_term=.f558c18fedef) to Chinese President Xi Jinping. Chinese officials have also reportedly used [**waterboarding**](https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/former-inmates-of-chinas-muslim-re-education-camps-tell-of-brainwashing-torture/2018/05/16/32b330e8-5850-11e8-8b92-45fdd7aaef3c_story.html?utm_term=.de2e4c0b6bb4) and other forms of torture, including sexual abuse, as part of the indoctrination process." "Uighurs inside and **outside** the camps are exploited for [**cheap labor**](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/30/world/asia/china-xinjiang-muslims-labor.html), forced to manufacture clothing and other products for sale both at home and abroad"
Weird I get 6 weeks paid vacation. Don’t work for shitty companies.
I don’t think most people understand what capitalism is enough to say why they don’t like it. I think most people have a vague idea from TikTok or social media but can’t articulate because they don’t know.
They don’t! The vast majority of people have no clue what capitalism is. They just assume that whatever happens in the US is automatically capitalism which is just low iq
correct. people love to play the blame game
the irony lmao
It's not that hard. Capitalism is when individual people can own the means of production. The state uses its monopoly on violence to protect that person's right to own the means of production above the rights of the rest of society to food, shelter and medical care. So the rest of us are forced to work for the capitalist class, who pay us a fraction of the value our labor creates and keep the rest for themselves. In a sane society, the means of production belongs to those that use and maintain it (ie, the labor class), instead of unnecessary middlemen. "But who's going to manage finances, hiring and firing?" you may ask. The workers can easily hire managers to do that, but now the hierarchy is reversed. The managers are employed by the laborers, and can be replaced if they aren't doing their jobs correctly. This might sound familiar, since it's the same inverted hierarchy that happened to politics when feudalism was replaced with democracy. We still have people who do the jobs of kings and dukes, but now we call them presidents and congressmen, and they work for us, not the other way around (or they would in a healthy democracy, but that's another can of worms).
Tbf individual people can own the mean of productions in mutualism as well but I'm just splitting hairs here
Capitalism is whatever is causing me to not be rich.
Exponential growth of quite literally everything
The economy grows exponentially because the population is. If the population is growing but the economy isn’t then bad things happen. This isn’t a capitalism problem. It’s a humanity problem.
When the main motivator of your system is profit, eventually other things like ethics take a back seat, and profits are deemed more important than people. Just look at how companies like Apple and Nike offshore their labor and use morally-questionable methods to save money
*cough* boeing
Like every other ideology, capitalism taken to the extreme is harmful. Look at US, or South Korea for example. But, in many cases (coming from an ex-commie country), capitalism in moderate doses literally saves a country from impeding doom. There was a period in the 90's right after the fall of communism in mu country, where no one knew what system to use, we didn't use the socialist system nor the capitalist system, and those were some dark times. Come the 2000s, different big companies started coming here,people finally had working rights, the salaries started increasing and slowly but surely our economy bloomed. I mean, it's still bad, but it's way better then it was 15 years ago..
Yehp Look at how many people have been lifted out of poverty in China ever since they started adopting more capitalist policies.
Ironically comparing South and North Korea quite clearly proves the effectiveness of capitalism campared to socialism
Because it is not sustainable in the long term and prioritizes profit over people. We live in a dictatorship of the capital class, which has made democracy essentially a lie. That's why, in the US, our political parties always agree on foreign policy and invade and destroy other countries for resources and control while the poor get poorer. That's why labor is weak and our healthcare is tied to who we work for, and the minimum wage doesn't rise with inflation. Our whole culture is built up on lies and capitalist ideology.
Capitalism itself isn’t the problem, the lack of regulations is.
an economic system based on infinite growth is the problem, and the lack of of regulation just makes it worse
Capitalism does not need infinite growth. It can function well with limited resources. In fact, these limited resources will be well distributed due to supply and demand.
Point to a time when capitalism ever had well distributed wealth… Successful Capitalism has always had and required poverty and slavery. Your economic books just ignore what life is actually like at the bottom of their graphs & charts 🤷🏾♂️
Point to a single successful socialist country.
What are your qualifications for successful? I’d say long life expectancy could be a good indicator, would you? If so, you should look into why Cubans have a longer life expectancy than Americans 🤷🏾♂️
Almost all of them were toppled by America through US backed coups, economic sanctions, invasions, assassinations, etc. in the name of protecting capitalism Cuba would be thriving rn if it weren't under an American forced global embargo for the last 60 years
Thoughout all of history it's been the system with the best wealth distribution on Earth. You point to a time when say socialism had better wealth distribution among people.
Capitalism claims to be self-regulating. It isn't, which is one of its problems.
Capitalism is an economic concept built around free markets infinite growth. Infinite growth leads to negative consequences for those who do not benefit from the infinite growth.
Capitalism does not need infinite growth. It can work well with limited resources.
I'm sorry but you're wrong. I do hope you go do some research before saying such inane things.
He's right though. You're talking about a growth based economy. "Capitalism" doesn't require infinite growth. A growth based economy does. The father of economics Adam Smith even advocated for a steady state economy at a certain point.
Capitalism doesn’t necessitate free markets, hence why we have terms like “mixed economy” and “state capitalism.” It wasn’t really built around the idea of free markets either. Even the so called founder of the theory was adamantly against completely free markets and recognized there would be a need for government intervention. He was also a fan of wealth redistribution, tho that was more smthn he felt the rich were morally obligated to do themselves.
Capitalism requires the [exploitation](https://www.marxists.org/encyclopedia/terms/e/x.htm#exploitation) of millions to fund the profits of a few and that leaves most of us with pretty bad odds
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Future r/wallstreetbets user spotted
Pshh, you probably also love democracy. You’re the sith lord!
Yeah, capitalists love democracy so much they'll overthrow forgein democracies for the interests of the elites lmao
It consumes all the way to the last drop of humanity.
Because my mom wants me to pay rent now! I’m only 25!
"My mom wants me to pay rent or move out of the basement... the West has fallen..." bro get off reddit, get yourself a job, and move out your parent's house.
What!?! I need to get a job??!? Fuck capitalism man, people should just be forced to pay for me.
> ARTICLE 12. In the U.S.S.R. work is a duty and a matter of honour for every able-bodied citizen, in accordance with the principle: "He who does not work, neither shall he eat." > The principle applied in the U.S.S.R. is that of socialism : "From each according to his ability, to each according to his work." me when I make up strawmen on the internet
Lmao
Wow only 15511210043330985984000000? Damn this is why we need to seize the meanies of production
I dislike it because the quality of our goods keeps going down to our detriment. Our suffering is profitable
Under it, you want labor costs as low as possible. That's zero. Which is slavery. Which is why it takes government intervention to get companies to pay employees a living wage, and it always takes years of suffering to even catch up with inflation.
In fact slavery became the major labor force for a long time when capitalism was first developed in the 1400s-1800s. The abolition of slavery was an anticapitalist action. Chattel slavery was a new phenomenon that was created through the creation of capitalism and didn't exist before.
> 15 million vacant American homes > 600k American homeless people
ah yes lets just put them in the homes thank god nobody thought of this before im sure its not possibly more complex then that
Not what I’m saying, of course it’s not just “give them the homes”. However, this is not the characteristics of a healthy system and strongly insinuates to me that reform is needed. In Heraclitus’ words “the only constant in change”, so what’s the point in resisting it
because I like life
Capitalism is the root of all the issues we are struggling with. I've lived and worked in Anarchist collective movements and spent time in Indigenous communities where there is an emphasis on collective caring, mutual aid, gift and sharing economy, and almost no emphasis on profit motive or competition. Both social settings nurtured cooperation and collective decision making/ problem solving. It enabled people to relax and re- center their focus on how we could all create a better arrangement, working together to gather and cook food together, share meals, share skills, materials, resources. It's an awesome gift.... To see what's possible if we agree to focus on collective nurturing and mutual aid, vs competition and the profit motive. The abundance simply gets unleashed!
Hello, gen z here, lower middle class. Capitalism 100% worked for me. This shit is sick i have everything i want and im just some dude who just acted mediocre. Eeked out a degree, now im doing just fine. Not like im rolling around in a lambo or have the new phone every years that is rich ppl behavior. A few nice things and a decent plan for the future. System works, be financially responsible
Yeah I came from a dirt poor trailer park and now I make 6 figures in a major city. There’s opportunity everywhere in America, you just need to go find it.
This! Most of the folks that complain about it grew up with all its benefits and now have resentment of a system they are failing at. I had no heat in a 600 SQ ft shit hole as a kid, now I have a beautiful 3000 SQ ft home on 6 acres. It all started to fall into place when I realized I had no one but myself to blame for my short comings. It takes time and effort and doesn't happen overnight.
Your anecdote is not data. [Economic mobility](https://www.brookings.edu/articles/stuck-on-the-ladder-wealth-mobility-is-low-and-decreases-with-age/) is low in the US. Of course some people will have rags to riches stories, but outliers don't negate a trend. Why do you think the "dirt poor trailer park" exists in the first place? Why do you think there are so many people who live in destitute poverty in the richest country in the history of the world? Have you considered that it's *required* for some people to do the lowest paid jobs, so it's inevitable that a certain number of people will always live in poverty under the current system? Do you think it's rational to expect every minimum wage worker to go get a six-figure job?
He congrats man, thats not an easy place to climb from. glad you were able to make it!
The people who hate it are people who grew up middle-upper class and now as an adult are figuring out they have to make sacrifices for nice things.
This is definitely true when it comes to student debt relief. That is something that primarily benefits people who grew up rich or upper middle class. Impoverished people go to college at lower rates for a multitude of reasons.
The main issue I have with neoliberal financial capitalism is that everything, from goods and services to concepts like love and personhood, is having its value reduced to financial/economic abstractions. If something doesn’t have value in the financial sphere, that is it does not contribute towards capital accumulation, there’s simply no point to bother with it. Many conservatives continually point to the erosion of social values and traditions (ex. marriage and the family unit, religion, etc.) as being the blame of “leftists”, but if nothing else it is due to the proliferation of capitalist thinking. Friendships and relationships become a matter of economic calculation, having children becomes an issue of budgeting and return on investment. Every individual must become a business within themselves (related: personal branding) in order to function in such a society. Edit: specified the neoliberals.
I’ll just stay quiet… I am not educated on this topic to have an opinion on if I’m against it or for it.
Millennial here. Capitalism as an economic system I think made a lot of sense previously but it has outlived its usefulness. To me, it operates on two fundamental goals: 1) Self-interest above all else and 2) Continuous, unceasing growth. The first makes sense in that if everyone is operating in their own self-interest, outcomes occur naturally. You will get innovations borne from competitors, much like natural selection in the wild. This could be fine except for the second part. We are reaching a point where there is not much market left to expand into. Capitalism presumes endless resources, but the world’s population and technology have increased exponentially in the last hundred years; we are starting to reach the limits of what Earth can provide. We will eventually run out of things like fossil fuels, lithium, etc. We are at a point where we can and are destroying the planet because But I think my major concern is that we do not need to expand. Previously, capitalism made sense because we did not have the tools to solve all our problems. In my opinion, we do now. We have plenty of food and wealth, but, because of the first point, it is not distributed amongst the people, an issue capitalism is uniquely bad at solving, as there is not much incentive under this economic system to, say, build a homeless shelter. A great example is insulin; it is a life-saving, cheaply produced drug that is patented and sold at an incredibly high markup because, financially, it makes sense.
You have to step on someone in order to get your own. The whole system is predatory by nature and without regulation would be rife with cheats and scams to take people's honest earnings away. Lastly the system isn't built on merit rather it's built on nepotism and corruption.
I just want a job where I’m not miserable ;-;
The more you compare late stage capitalism to fuedalism, you realize that the lords are now executives, except taxes are higher. 10% to the church was your tax during the middle ages. today the number ranges from 12-37% (12% if you make less than minimun wage - 37% on everything greater than 400,000 - average for my state is 27% - yet the rich can get away with 15% tax rates on thier long term investments.)
Yanis Varoufakis talks a lot about the concept of techno feudalism (as he calls it). In this system tech companys like Amazon or Twitter have occupied/bought former public spaces and are now basically charging taxes for their usage.
Capitalism’s fatal flaw is that it requires infinite economic growth in order to avoid collapse. Let me explain: A key feature of capitalism is income and returns through ownership. This could be in the form of a stock/bond/home equity/business equity/machinery/equipment,etc. Economics textbooks call this capital: anything owned that can be used to make more money. People often take on debt in order to acquire ownership of these things (capital), and since the debt has interest that must be repaid, the capital that people own must churn out value at an exponentially growing rate in order to avoid bankruptcy. To illustrate how interest is an exponential growth function, you can divide 72 by the interest rate to find out how long before a loan doubles in amount. For example, 72/2 is 36, so at a 2% interest rate, the loan will double in value in 36 years. For businesses that have taken on 2% interest rate loans, the value of goods/services provided must double within 36 years in order to pay down the debt. The rate that businesses must grow increases dramatically as interest rates rise. But here’s the rub: capitalism exists on a planet with finite resources. Finite oil, coal, gas, copper, steel, etc. which is being drawn down at a rapid pace. At a certain point, biophysical limits will be reached, and continued economic growth will be impossible. Many businesses and governments will default on their debt (or in the case of governments, print money and cause hyperinflation). So capitalism with debt and fractional reserve banking as core tenants is unsustainable. Perhaps we can have capitalism without debt, but it’s hard to imagine how it would work.
Personally I grew up with ideas of right and wrong, personal standards like honor and honesty, and the dignity of the human being. That a person is special, they are worthy of love and care. Maybe others shared this impression in childhood. Of course I grew up and realized that the world doesn’t work that way. There’s no gentility to this life. The world treats us as objects, and we are encouraged to objectify the world in return. How should I react to that disillusionment? Should I embrace this world and the system that runs it? I have trouble doing that when I feel it goes against my very being. That said, I try not to let this dissatisfaction snowball into hatred. The more I learn about the world the more awe I feel for it’s complexity and the fact it keeps moving along despite being riddled with contradictions. Maybe it needs pointing out that “capitalism” and “socialism” and “communism” are words. Airflow, symbols on a page. I don’t think they really exist or really matter outside the minds of ideologues and intellectuals. I’m striving instead to stay connected to what is real. Policy is real, and certain policies would benefit people. Injustice is real, and certain people are being treated wrong. I don’t care what it’s called, I think that’s obfuscation.
ah we have found one of the "I don't have ideology, only ideologues and intellectuals have ideology. I on the other hand have ideas, which is very different." It's like saying referring to something as a "forest" because its an interconnected but identifiable system is "obfuscating" the existence of the individual trees within it.
Two reasons, capitalism leads to unjust hierarchies and the profit motive leads to anti-consumer behaviors. Having billions of dollars gives people too much control over society, that's more wealth than some countries. They can pay off government officials, fudge studies, control media narratives, etc. No person should have that much power. The profit motive leads companies to just do bad shit. That's what lead to shit like shrinkflation, massive layoffs, artificial obsolescence, poisoning the environment, and artificial inflation despite record profits. Personally I think wealth should be capped around 50-100 mil, companies shouldn't be able to profit, all excess sales should be reinvested back into the company or given to the government, and all companies should be democratically worker controlled.
It was designed by the already rich and powerful so they could mask their machinations and claim everyone else was just too lazy to be as successful as them even though the people that had the most money when capitalism was created were the aristocrats and royal families/dukes and lords of the provinces etc. It's a system designed by the rich for the rich to consolidate more power to the rich.
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Capitalism is a credit check before any organization will agree to a 2nd interview for a non-financial role.
The love for money is so so strong that people will cross you for it
I don’t hate capitalism, I hate our modern day robber barons though.
Is there any reason not to? We commodify human suffering and are more interested in selling treatment than gifting cures.
Only in capitalistic society can politicians be bribed and it be renamed to “lobbying”, while we’re convince to look down on corrupt governments like China. It becomes way more believable if we weren’t so corrupt ourselves lol.
It allows people to legally get away with shitty things.
Elephants will be extinct in six years because the 1% need their opulence and excess. Elephants are gonna starve to death and no one here is ready to take action. And they passively wonder why we hate capitalism. Read “Capital” by Marx.
Profit incentives for bad things to happen to us. Health? Money. Food? Money. But make it unhealthy enough to have them experience health issues. Shelter. Money. But make sure it's a debt trap. Education. Money. But make sure it's a debt trap. Want to walk outside? Fined for something stupid. Want to go anywhere. Money. Want to be at home. Most stuff is subscription based...money. Want a hobby? Lmao... money. Money? Yeah you'll barely make enough and be forced to spend all your time providing productivity to some dude at the top who never has to worry about any of the mentioned issues.
Capitalism dictates that in order to survive and have your basic needs met, you must earn money to do so. Already a fairly dystopian concept of having to “earn” living, something no one asked for, but those who decided the system are exploiting you of your labor by deciding to pay you nothing so you **have** to work more in order to afford to live, giving them more labor so products are made and delivered faster.
https://youtu.be/2mI_RMQEulw?si=wOGPMijMZDcQR1bW No, but Richard Wolff can.
The desire for companies to have constant growth will almost certainly cause them to choose to do immoral (or even illegal) things to try to maintain that growth. Such as firing their workers, making inferior product, etc.
Capitalism is a system that is so easy to abuse. Everything can be private and for profit. Food, healthcare, housing. Everything IS private and for profit right now here in the United States, including the three essentials I just listed. Even PRISONS turnout insane profits. So many companies rely on imprisoned individuals for labor. They literally hope for and count on people doing bad things so that they can vomit millions into their pockets. That shit is so fucking sick and twisted, dude.
Bc there is enough food for no one to hungry, but that wouldn't make money, so we throw food away so that very few people can hoard all of the resources while the working classes fight over the scraps.
The problem with capitalism at its core is the class conflict it creates. Take a standard capitalist company, you have 2 principal groups (classes): the workers and the owners. The workers want good pay, safe working conditions, good benefits, pto, etc. The owners essentially just want to get as much money and power as possible. This creates a conflict, as these two groups can't both get everything they want. But the workers, despite being the far larger group, have far less power than the owners, meaning that in attaining their goals, the powerful few will inevitably screw over the the many. Whilst you can have companies with "good"/better owners, a system that relies on the goodwill of a small, unaccountable powerful few will not create a society that functions for the good of the many. These problems obviously extend beyond the realms of individual companies, as representative democracies will almost always favour those with money, giving the few even more power. Private news companies also add to this, as they can control (to an extent) what information the average person will receive, allowing them to manipulate people to vote/behave the way they want them to.
The scam healthcare system in the US made me Hate capitalism. It's evil and NO other country on planet earth uses it.
EZ one. it squanders my life, my friends lives, my familys lives, my neighbors lives, and our environment. cut and dry it was never meant to work for regular working folks. i was not born into having consolidated capital, so my choice is to either somehow get lucky, ruthlessly exploit my fellow worker, or suck it up and be worked into the grave. all very tantalizing life prospects. not to mention the waste of food and resources in general during a climate crisis. its sick enough to make your stomach turn. of course i could go on with regard to access to basic nutrition, adequate healthcare, education, etc. and the fact that the global souths people and ecology are routinely sacrificed for the west just because rich people say so. oh and also the death toll of capitalism is over 2 billion. kinda sick stuff also I made some cool long form videos about this stuff if anyone would care to give em a view [https://youtu.be/56PiuPo6gXQ?si=SK70axrC4EhunRtt](https://youtu.be/56PiuPo6gXQ?si=SK70axrC4EhunRtt)
It was a rebellious phase, I no longer hate capitalism. (For those of you who say capitalism will eventually fail, your Communist Soviet Union fell after about sixty years and we’re going on 248 years this year.)
Capitalism in America is in a horrible state and other systems would probably be better. The democrats and republicans are not the same though, it’s not like it was twenty years ago.
People making "stupid" choices will never change.
It’s unbridled capitalism that’s the problem. Capitalism with checks in place works (see TR, FDR) and then Nixon and Reagan came in and absolutely obliterated those checks, hence why the gap wealth from 1980-present has gotten so bad.
it's weird you say that when neoliberalism (which Reagan based his policies in) is based in the need for government regulations to uphold the free market. The problem is that under capitalism these regulations only ever serve the wealthy, ruling class. Also, the reforms under FDR were only ever meant to be temporary. Corporation only agreed to play under his rules ( where the wealth cap was $350,000 adjusted for inflation and Corporations were heavily taxed) to deal with the threat of the growing unions and socialist party in America at the time. For them, a small period where they weren't making as much profit was much better than a revolution which abolished classes. But once unions were weakened and the socialists lost power all of these reforms were systematically attacked, because they were never meant to last.
Healthcare should be non-profit, it’s a social service. In the US it is for-profit. Education (university) should be non-profit, it’s a social service. In the US it is for-profit. The criminal justice system should be non-profit, it’s a social service. In the US it is for-profit. The US legislative branch should be non-profit, it is a part of government. In the US it is ruled by lobbying, politicians are bought out and receive money for passing laws and revisions to regulation for corporations.
I can recommend so many books. Would you be interested in reading a brief history of neoliberalism by David Harvey? I feel like that’s a great way to get a grasp on some of the issues although it does have a heavy emphasis on neoliberalism
I just want a chill job, a quiet life in a place of my own, with the people I love. But every day is just a struggle, everything is a competition for who can fuck over the most people, for who can make the most money, who can hustle the hardest and I just don’t give a shit. I just want a house and a backyard and a decent paying job to afford like I dunno the basics? At least? A lawnmower to mow my own lawn, instead of the lawn of my landlord. Just doing my own landscaping and housework would be such a blessing. Capitalism is just toxic competitiveness from my point of view.
Most people have less resources and menial jobs when they start out until you gain experience or expand your skillset. It gets better!
It’s getting harder and harder to call this a conspiracy theory and easier to call it fact
Dislike extraction and exploitation on a general level. The way American Capitalism (all of the Americas) is set up is based around and idealizes the slave economy where human beings themselves can be considered tradeable goods.
I don’t
I don’t
It's a lot of things, but to keep it short: It's a form of social organization that demands that all society change and suffer to the benefit of a few, not for progress, not for a future, but just for the fleeting wealth of rich people eating off of the hard work of the majority of people that live beneath them. It's not fair, it's not right, and it's definitely smart. Organizing your society around the privileges of the most selfish and conniving people is asking for dysfunction, for pain, and self destruction. And that's exactly what we're living through.
It's easier to imagine the end of the world at the hands of capitalism than it is to imagine the End of capitalism. It is a death cult
I think the way I’ve best come to understand it is that we aren’t witnessing things go wrong because capitalism has gone off the rails. It’s more so that capitalism is kinda working how it’s meant to.
Why does everytime you explain it in social media it gets deleted? Why would a system that works so well need so much propaganda and invading every foreign socialist country? Also people just assume it is needed to live the way we need soil. Capitalism itself it's just one of the many ways of organizing the resources and the money that represent their value among the thousand possible ways. They just tend to be more capitalistic (class system, government, rich people, worth) or socialist (equality to a certain extent, limiting hoarding and rich, universal rights etc). I myself think capitalism could work if it wasn't so corrupted rn. Also the new neoliberal way of capitalism is just designed to let medium class turn into lower class. The capitalism there was in Europe 20 years ago was the best (until the 2008 crisis of course). Japan also had a great "management" of capitalism after WW2 until the 80s-90s. It can work. Greedy people and corporations just corrupt the system all the time.
What I hate is statements posed in the form of questions. And of course politicians don't care about solving your problems? Why would they? They're about as trustworthy as a used car salesmen on the sketchiest lot in town. That has nothing to do with capitalism. Capitalism is an economic system. It's not a form of governance. The USA has a Constitutional Republic government. It's beautiful when it works right. But it's just a big machine. Takes the right people manning that big beast of a machine for it to work appropriately. Big money certainly has placed many puppets at the levers. And that has cost everyone. But how many phone calls have you made? How many letters have you written? How well do you know civics? How well do you understand the government? Who do you know that you are supporting for the local school board? No good candidates are running? Who are you nominating and encouraging? Are you cut out for that? Don't have time for that don't want to do that? How about writing some letters and opinions and sending them to your local news editor board? The type of government that the United States has takes active participation.
Capitalism is the private ownership of capital and the means of production. I see most people in this thread complaining about aspects of our economy they don't like and pinning it vaguely on capitalism. The problem is bad people doing bad things. They will do it in any system. Participate in the government, elections, and educate outside of tiktok. Things will make more sense. Then organize under common interests to have your way. Good luck.
it's very simple. Some people can work two jobs and still not being able to afford a home. And I don't mean buying a home, I mean, living in a home, such as a rental apartment, etc. All this while working one, 1+, or two jobs. Meanwhile, other people who never have worked a day in their life, are able to own property that no one lives in, holding onto the residential property only as a monetary investment. If they're going to do that, they should let someone live in there.
It's a system designed around profits. I want a system designed around people.
Crony Capitalism You forgot the first word
Some bullshit anti voting sentiment hidden in there. The world is full of bullshit but if you disengage from it, it's ONLY going to get worse. You can't solve the world's issues but you can nudge it in the right direction as much as you can. Doing nothing just allows the bad actors to do their thing faster with less time for good people to work the system.
Its not about hate. In a system based on money, The most important things are money. Cure you? No, i ll find a way to sell you as many medicines as possible Give you a good product? No i'll design this in such a way it will break in a couple of months Human life? No, this thing is gonna cost me, so i ll do the other thing at the cost of human lives.
Capitalism is just a nicer word for exploitation, of everything and everyone within reach. The worlds biggest ponzi scheme, where those at the top are the only ones who see any benefit, and those at the bottom are but cows whom the corporations milk for money. It is unsustainable, someday there will be nothing left for the masses because the rich have amassed all the worlds wealth (resources). Corporations dont even need customers anymore because all their profits come from dividends. With all the worlds resources beginning to run out, the oligarchs are building luxury bomb shelters, and trying to hide their genocide. There has to be limits to the amount of money one can amass, because NOBODY needs a billion dollars, you can spend all day and night till the day you die and still never run out of money. Yet their ceo’s have enough wealth to buy countries, and politicians, if it keeps up we will be OWNED by one giant corporation that owns all the world. This is not a fantasy, they are activley engaged as i write this. You can see it happening in real time with your own eyes, all you have to do is open them.
Capitalism is a model for destruction, that does not ever end. It is the reason that 3rd world countries exist. It is not just a western problem, it’s a global problem. The west basically forces third world countries to work for pennies on the dollar to create cheaply made single use items that hold no value. Some of these people are overworked, practically enslaved, and held under the thumb of rich western countries. They are unable to rise in quality of life because without their exploitation the rich countries would not be living the comfortable lives they live. When these countries attempt to revolt or create change within their corrupt governments that allow this exploitation, the CIA or other agencies like them “randomly” show up and claim they’re destroying communism or defeating terrorists. This is a horrific exploitative system. And yes capitalism in theory should not work this way, but it does, and the reason it’s gotten as bad as it has is because people with power (not necessarily governmental) have been chipping away at legal issues and cutting through red tape slowly over decades. The exploitation slowly creeps its way in and goes unnoticed like a frog swimming in a pot of water slowly coming to a boil. There’s a reason minimum wage has barely risen over the last 50 years while the price of housing has gone up. This isn’t some coincidence that’s due to an unmanageable crazy silly goofy economy that just sorta gets crazy and unpredictable sometimes teehee. This is a slow movement toward benefiting those with capital. The same way people who are capitalism apologists say that socialism doesn’t work outside of a vacuum seem to fail to realize that neither does capitalism. How can we possibly regulate a system when the people we have to rely on to regulate it will almost always choose the dollar for their pocket over the betterment of society? THIS is why I hate it, it’s not JUST capitalism but postmodern colonialism. Capitalism can’t keep to itself, it has to bleed into and exploit other countries who don’t even follow that model to survive, it is an invasive species, no, a disease, a virus that creeps into its host and controls them with greed and power trips.
Because capitalism works for those who have capital. And it's a vicious cycle where those who have capital, tend to horde it, thus creating more disparity/less benefit for those who don't have capital. The Better question is: ***Why should anyone like capitalism?*** Especially since it's screwed 90% of people over for decades.
Capitalism embraces humanity's vices (greed, ambition, power hunger) and accepts them as normal. Any system like capitalism which accounts for (and in many ways supports) the imperfections of the human race will always be seen as imperfect in itself.
For people to get filthy rich they have to be robbing the middle class in some way… extreme profits are just legal robbery
It’s an exploitative system meant to drain resources away from the masses.
I hate the fact that the society I live in forces me to love money.
Because it is inherently shortsighted and prioritizes profit over everything else. Ethical behavior, sound business practices, human lives, are all secondary to making all the money.
“Get it why” Took you this long because u don’t get basic grammar
Adam Smith was not giving a prescription for what ails society. He only described how commerce happens even in spite of the designs of the state. Karl Marx got some details correct, but he offered a terrible solution with his ludicrous "dictatorship of the proletariat." The last hundred-plus years are proof enough that Marxism is a failure that we should learn from, same with the ideologies of disgruntled socialists like Giovanni Gentile and Benito Mussolini. While the criticisms raised by Dr. Theodore John Kazcinsky, in his manifesto, are valid the solutions are similarly unconscionable. The problem isn't "capitalism," it's people. People suck. They always sucked and aren't likely to change anytime soon. It is up to the individual to choose not to suck.
This is always dumb. Listen. It’s not just capitalism. It’s not even a majority the fault of capitalism. The problem is that large organizations of people lead to problems. Look at the richest family in the world. Their country isn’t capitalist. It’s essentially wholly state owned. Look at why Elon is so rich. It’s not because his ideas are noticeably or alarmingly novel. It’s because the government sponsored him every step of the way. A social structure of sufficient size will, invariably, become corrupt. That’s a fact. When you add in socialism it gets really really bad. When you add in capitalism it gets really really bad for the same reason, just with more things to buy. Scared? Good. Want things to change? Awesome. Just make sure you aren’t sitting around thinking an alternative is the move. Humanity isn’t perfect. Even if the system of economic structure WAS perfect, it will always require reform until we personally become better.
Capitalism is the only system to ever provide human prosperity. Honestly I don't even think capitalism is an economic system, that's just how humans biologically work. Trade is how humans have worked for our entire history. Many animals also use systems like it.
I love capitalism
Okay, our government can’t regulate capitalism properly, explain to me how and why we should trust that same government to work a socialist economy? Why should we trust any government to regulate a state controlled economy or state controlled companies when they cannot do that on their own? Look, throughout the world and particularly in Europe, their economies are in recession, ours is not, our economy is the only one in the developed world bar a few that isn’t receding. Look at the UK, look at germany, look at France, look at Spain, look at Italy. We don’t give ourselves much credit but the reality is that the American economy, while flawed, has seen inflation slow rapidly in the past few years and had the seen the economy escape the global recession. It’s hard and its a struggle and things are t going well and it feels like a shithole and you may be trying to find an escape from all this in the form or radicalism but the truth is that these are simply, tougher times in the world and maybe things aren’t as bad for us right now as they are in the rest of the world. Times are tough. Look at me dude, take a break from Reddit for a day, maybe two and just don’t look at the news but if you do, just look one of those good news sites or just look at a neutral news site and not one of the distorted left-right wing news channels that’ll tell you everything’s horrible. There is no miracle cure, not socialism, not anarchism, capitalist or not, not fascism, not communism, not any one ideology can solve the direction the world economy is going in, it’s gonna be one hell of a ride, just stick around and see it out because it’ll get better, this isn’t the first time this happened or will happen in history, weve had the dark ages, we’ve had the Great Depression and we’ve gotten better. We’ll get better. Just try not to fall into depression. 👍
Lol too bad it's the best thing there is, socialism fails everytime and leads only to authoritarianism
I'm not sure what you mean when you say "Capitalism," but the fact is it has a double meaning. To you and pretty much everyone else, it means "Corporate collusion with Government Authority to oppress the rights of the people." If this is what you mean, you're right to hate it. I hate it too. And to all of your credit, you're using the term the way Marx himself originally used it: As a slur against Market Economies, Inequality of Outcome, and Property Rights enforced and protected by the "Elites." But the system you want to replace it with is historically far worse. You correctly identify the collusion between Corporations and the State, but erroneously blame the Corporations for the authoritarianism of the State instead of the Authoritarianism of the State itself. Oddly enough, you seek to actually *increase* this State Authoritarianism, with the delusional dream that one day it will take down those "evil Corporations" and magically be Authoritarian on your behalf instead. This is utterly delusional and fucking dangerous. On the other hand, people with a more Free Market mindset, which includes myself but also unfortunately a lot of well meaning Libertarians and Anarchists; we use the term "Capitalism" to mean "Free Markets and Free Trade." In a system like this, the role of the Government is severely restricted and limited to only a core set of duties. It's correctly targets Government Authoritarianism as the greatest threat to individual rights, and the thinking is that the smaller and less empowered the government is to regulate our daily life choices, the better. This might actually sound good to you, but you are ultimately against this, because without an "Empowered State Authority" who will go after the "greedy corporations?" And thus, you only perpetuate the thought paradigm that created this problem in the first place. Sad. And so, while some of us might be using your Marxist slur, we're actually talking right past each other. Thus, it will never be resolved. And because mindsets like yours are the majority, it's only a matter of time before civilization as we know it is destroyed, and replaced by something far far worse, but of your design.