Ok, Capitalism is Spiraling Out of Control Right?
- Thread starter BWoog
- Start date
Sure feels that way. Lots of our current economic system was built on the back of almost 0% interest rates for the last ten+ years. So much of the tech world especially is built on it, and a lot gaming by extension.
Change could happen elsewhere and maybe those nations will show the world how to successfully build away from capitalism and have a blossoming society. However, I very much doubt any such rapid shifts could occur in the US. Wealth and corporations rule the western world and any sudden shifts will tank the world economy.
Absolutely, and Capitalism inevitably crumbles, but be warned, there's a LOT of Capitalist simps around. They're like Homer and Bart chasing that pig. "It's still good, it's still good"
Should be radicalizing.
Vast majority of people are just trying to survive day to day and have no time, money, energy to go out and disrupt the status quo.
Though I do believe we will eventually hit a breaking point - just need that catalyst to take place.
Lol I wouldn't worry about their responses - you were completely fine in what you said.
Some people simply don't have any concept of nuance - I've found that on Era a ton of users are extremely binary in their thinking - if you don't explicitly agree, you are wrong/against me.
Making some joke about how podcasters are also trying to wring blood from a stone is completely accurate, while recognizing there are innumerable other entities doing much worse (which apparently has to be explicitly stated lol).
Millionaires don't even factor into this stuff.
To the billionaire class millionaires are just like us, everyday people, as they will never attain that level of wealth.
The order of magnitude difference between them is so insane that millionaires are effectively meaningless.
Like for example - my mom technically would be a millionaire - but only due to the fact that my great great grandfather/mother squatted in (and via this, gained ownership) of an abandoned farm in the 1830s that has remained in our family till today while the area grew up around it. The house is worth nothing today, but the land is valuable. My single mother never made more than like $35k a year for her entire life but yet could be a "millionaire" if she so desired to cash out so to speak (but would never cause family homestead is too important to her).
That's a lot of words to say that millionaires aren't (really) the problem, it's the billionaires above that literally buy legislation/media that mess it all up. They constantly wage the culture wars to distract us from the class wars.
In a way, I also think that there was a boom in population and economy at a time where mass employment was necessary, fueling a post-war economy from a nation that was able to capitalize off the safety of its geographic location to remain isolated from the destruction of two wars and make significant gains as well as draw even more people around the world to that prosperity. At the same time, non-whites were disadvantaged and kept down while whites received economic subsidies for major markets like housing. It was also at a time where cities were being fled and suburbs were being grown, which is now sort of reversing since cities are growing while a lot of suburban/rural areas are either stagnant or in population decline. Don't think that's getting any better since jobs are drying up in the cheap areas, and now wealth is consolidating in more in demand areas, jacking up the cost of living with no control. Corporate short term thinking and obsessions over quarterly bottom lines are screwing over consumers because now to keep pace with that boom era and show growth to shareholders, they need to not only cut as much cost as possible, but raise pricing. Covid worsened this because supply chain shocks pretty much effected everyone everywhere at the same time and gave them an opportunity to raise prices due to increased scarcity, but now those prices are not falling in a lot of areas. I don't think this is getting any better. Now if history went a very different way instead of entering the neoliberal era, maybe we'd be fairing a bit better. I still think capitalism works a lot better than most give it credit for around here, as a dynamic, self-adjusting economy is leagues better than a totally planned command economy, but regulations were needed long ago to keep capitalists in check.
Millionaires aren't the problem until they are billionaires. Some make it, others don't. More seem to be making it now though.
I think people are on average more aware that the system is fucking rigged than we give them credit for, but as you say the necessity to spend so much time surviving means it's harder to engage in physical disruption.
I could post some of the other replies about it always beeing out of control (and they'd be right) but I do think things have ramped up significantly due to Covid and Ukraine. Opportunists are seeing how much they can pump out of people before they buckle and we aren't going back to anything manageable until there is major pushback.
Last edited:
the great plague probably had huge capitalistic gains; i mean we did have the renaissance after it
ukrain and russia reminds us of the peril of the european borderland
this is my land-border borderland . . . no it's not!
. . . so while they're fighting each other, let's make capital from their misfortune
I know you jest, but I love how factually wrong this statement is.
Capitalism requires classes. So not everyone. Anyone at best.
The working class flourished after the great plague, as those who were still alive could demand higher wages (I know you were kidding but I always found this to be an interesting point)
I realize I am powerless against this phenomenon. The only thing I can do is consume wisely, avoid corporate worship and try to vote responsibly.
I like this place because even if there's a lot of corporate bootlicking, it's always called out for what it is.
Capitalism is wholly unsustainable but as long as they can keep squeezing the pennies it won't stop.
We live in a dystopian nightmare
We live in a dystopian nightmare
It is and there's no conspiracy. Share prices dropping should be a natural part of the cycle; instead, the idea of share prices dropping or even being flat has become so abhorrent that companies are now going to dangerous lengths to prevent it from happening. For the rich, the very concept of risk on investment has gone, it's not allowed.
For me it's that wallstreet speculation bubble which idk if it's been sped up by the silicon valley or what but the whole thing has become absolutely crazy over the last 20 years or so. These massive disruptive companies that DO NOT generate any "real" profits and are not sustainable in any sort of business sense are just hyped up in value, and their whole business model is just getting people to invest in them. Stuff like Uber, and every single steaming service that killed all the traditional media consumption we had before. I don't know if it's always been a pyramid scheme but it definitely feels that way now.
I think spiralling out of control is capitalism working as intended. limitless unfettered growth (of profits) regardless of the human cost.
It's just that now that many "average" people in wealthy countries directly feel the effects due to inflation.
having said that the inflation sucks and hurts as hell. at least it's mostly stopped increasing for now over here so we can get used to the new pain level 💀
It's just that now that many "average" people in wealthy countries directly feel the effects due to inflation.
having said that the inflation sucks and hurts as hell. at least it's mostly stopped increasing for now over here so we can get used to the new pain level 💀
We trapped ourselves in a system that destroys life on the planet, extracts more resources than can be regenerated and is not beneficial for the vast majority of our species. It will all collapse eventually, but we are so desperate to keep this system alive that we will go to more and more extreme measures to do so.
I understand the frustration from American members, not sure what's going on over there. Just the fact that the average worker only takes 2 weeks of vacation seems crazy, 5-6 weeks is minimum in Sweden and most take it out every year.
But what do we mean when we say capitalism? Every western democracy is a mixed economy with large state intuitions and oversight, Sweden and US included.
Capitalism doesn't have to work like it does in the US. And for the record Sweden where I'm from has had crazy inflation and exchange rates, most goods have gone up 30-50% over a few years. This is due to a variety of factors like Covid, this I feel cant be put on "capitalism".
But what do we mean when we say capitalism? Every western democracy is a mixed economy with large state intuitions and oversight, Sweden and US included.
Capitalism doesn't have to work like it does in the US. And for the record Sweden where I'm from has had crazy inflation and exchange rates, most goods have gone up 30-50% over a few years. This is due to a variety of factors like Covid, this I feel cant be put on "capitalism".
Echoing "Always has been" "Working as intended"
They privatise essential services like water or energy, pushing losses onto the public while pocketing profits. Hypercapitalist societies favour older voters with generous pensions and tax breaks, at the expense of younger generations who cannot afford assets, pay high taxes, living with abyssmally low wages.
The game was rigged from the start.
Elites benefitted from capitalism; they influence the system to further enrich themselves, exploting loopholes, avoid paying taxes and happy to buy up public assets like social housing (that are taxpayer funded), then sell it for millions.
They privatise essential services like water or energy, pushing losses onto the public while pocketing profits. Hypercapitalist societies favour older voters with generous pensions and tax breaks, at the expense of younger generations who cannot afford assets, pay high taxes, living with abyssmally low wages.
The game was rigged from the start.
Those saying no, it's "working as designed" are wrong. No, capitalism wasn't "designed" to be this broken. It's not like a bunch of billionaires got together and thought up a way to get even richer, and everyone got on board. Giant corporations didn't spring from the earth once some evil rich dude had an epiphany. It's become this shitty over time, though it has been absolutely broken since...around the mid 70s, statistically speaking.
It's the "high interest rates + inflation" effect.
Who's rich can protect themselves, who's not will have a huge quality of life dip.
That's why you don't fuck with inflation, it'll take 3-4 years for things to "normalize"
Who's rich can protect themselves, who's not will have a huge quality of life dip.
That's why you don't fuck with inflation, it'll take 3-4 years for things to "normalize"
i assume you're talking about the communist manifesto? that's 176 years old.
Exactly. And you can't regulate capitalism anyway. Right wing parties will be elected and regulations will be removed. It's an endless circle of trying to hold back capitalism from eating us all. It doesn't work and it leads to extremely slow progress.
Capitalism needs strong guard rails to make sure it doesn't just eat everything around it, since it concentrates wealth in fewer and fewer people, and wealth brings power, and power is how you enforce your will on others, bringing in more wealth...
These guard rails have in the past been stronger or weaker, depending on lots of things, but an important part was the very clear "if this goes wrong the lower classes will murder us", or "if the state is weak foreigners will come and take everything from us".
For one reason or another, the guard rails seem to be mostly missing now.
ETA:
And while capitalism is our problem now, don't think other systems are immune. Not while they're made of people who have the means and the ability to fudge with the rules to make sure that things go their way at the expense of others, history is filled with examples of civilizations that started in a way, and you had people poke at it and mess with it to make sure they and their family got the results they wanted, until the base of that civilization is eroded away, leading to them being ex-civilizations.
These guard rails have in the past been stronger or weaker, depending on lots of things, but an important part was the very clear "if this goes wrong the lower classes will murder us", or "if the state is weak foreigners will come and take everything from us".
For one reason or another, the guard rails seem to be mostly missing now.
ETA:
And while capitalism is our problem now, don't think other systems are immune. Not while they're made of people who have the means and the ability to fudge with the rules to make sure that things go their way at the expense of others, history is filled with examples of civilizations that started in a way, and you had people poke at it and mess with it to make sure they and their family got the results they wanted, until the base of that civilization is eroded away, leading to them being ex-civilizations.
I have realised this cold hard reality recently while investigating history of UK interest rates.
Our monthly mortgage payments are 75% of my monthly salary, house bought last year.
If we had bought the same value house a couple of years ago, then the mortgage payments would be closer to 33% of my monthly salary.
It's nearly a £1000 difference.
A huge difference in our money per month being nearly £1000 down is due to suits making a decision on interest rates. People who were further than us in their relationship and bought a few years ago, on the same salaries as us, are way more comfortable just down to the arbitrary nature of how all this works.
Of course on the same note, someone who can't currently afford a house due to interest rates being even higher, is saying the same thing about us.
And of course I understand that interest rates have been stupidly low in the UK, and understand how it all works.
Our monthly mortgage payments are 75% of my monthly salary, house bought last year.
If we had bought the same value house a couple of years ago, then the mortgage payments would be closer to 33% of my monthly salary.
It's nearly a £1000 difference.
A huge difference in our money per month being nearly £1000 down is due to suits making a decision on interest rates. People who were further than us in their relationship and bought a few years ago, on the same salaries as us, are way more comfortable just down to the arbitrary nature of how all this works.
Of course on the same note, someone who can't currently afford a house due to interest rates being even higher, is saying the same thing about us.
And of course I understand that interest rates have been stupidly low in the UK, and understand how it all works.
Capitalism has been absolutely broken since wayyyy before then. Hell child labour and absolutely atrocious and abusive working conditions in factories have been part of capitalism way before that even. All in the name of profits above human lives.
The problem is that fascists exist and can easily and quickly influence people within the free market nonsense. It's easier than ever to reach people on a global scale.
Capitalists don't mind fascists and will let them run free as it keeps the working class away from them. It will likely backfire on the capitalists later on, but they can't see further than what exists in the moment.
So, instead of a working class that rises up against the bourgeoisie, we get a working class that fights itself.
Climate change isn't going to help out here either. The working class will be focused on keeping the limited resources for their own families and keeping migrants away.
This and the market cap of Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, Google and Meta (7 billion, give or take) being higher than any country GDP outside of the US and China.
Companies were not meant to be richer than countries yet here we are thanks to the US allowing unfettered capitalism to create life affecting monsters of corporations.
When I unironically see takes as "layoffs are good actually" from defenders of these companies, you know that the cult of capitalism is stronger than you imagine. Worker protections are bad because they make companies not earn that extra £££, to hell with the people affected.
A reminder than profit requires someone to lose money. Capitalism at its core entrenches inequality and is a transfer of wealth from the masses to the few.
Imagine if we had a government that actually protected its citizens from these blood sucking corporations instead of letting everyone wallow in despair, barely able to avoid housing and food insecurity at every turn (if they're lucky.) All the while funding insane wars abroad with all the cash they extract from us. It feels fucking awful.
This whole conversation is why I'm terrified that Biden will lose. Fascism is the end game of capitalism. Clinton was right when he said it was the economy. Trump could literally eat a dog on live TV at this point and people at the polls will remember the cost of eggs when they go to vote, nevermind the fact that it was Trumps party that has streamlined this train accident.
The basic idea of capitalism is ''profits go to the owners''. That idea in itself is so fundamentally broken that capitalism cannot work.
It's worked for centuries, longer than any system that's come since trying to replace it.
The same suits kept those interest rates incredibly low to facilitate a recovery post 2008 and the economy rolling. COVID changed the situation drastically and exposed the lack of guardrails which resulted in unparalleled inflation (in most of our lifetime) and interest rates have skyrocketed.
One of the reasons things have gone this way is, weirdly enough, the fall of the USSR and the knowledge of living conditions there, in China and other Communist countries.
Before, like in the Great Depression, politicians had an incentive to bring in the New Deal, to reinforce the guardrails, higher taxes, more wealth redistribution, kill the monopolies, all of that, because otherwise, there was a chance that the people would go Red.
Nowadays, going Red, well, some people think they might be able to do it right this time, but the masses are still not there. Not that I think Communist countries aren't also vulnerable to their own cycle of "things work decently, people with power tinker with the rules to make it better for them, repeat for n times, it's not decent for most of the population anymore".
Before, like in the Great Depression, politicians had an incentive to bring in the New Deal, to reinforce the guardrails, higher taxes, more wealth redistribution, kill the monopolies, all of that, because otherwise, there was a chance that the people would go Red.
Nowadays, going Red, well, some people think they might be able to do it right this time, but the masses are still not there. Not that I think Communist countries aren't also vulnerable to their own cycle of "things work decently, people with power tinker with the rules to make it better for them, repeat for n times, it's not decent for most of the population anymore".
Given that it's nearly impossible to save with rent steadily increasing, insurance increasing, commodity prices increasing, grocery prices increasing, & entertainment prices increasing, all while employment requirements are systemically ratcheted up, job security is a thing of the past, and increases in pay are reserved for very few who choose to ideologically serve their boss rather than produce anything, I think yeah, yeah it is out of control.
Power serves power, and capitalism is an effective way to do it, especially with algorithmic growth applied.
We're not humans to them. We're single use plastics.
Power serves power, and capitalism is an effective way to do it, especially with algorithmic growth applied.
We're not humans to them. We're single use plastics.
Agree with most takes here.
Wealthy inequality just leads to more wealth inequality if no protections are brought in. Combine that with so many services being a 'rent' (subscription) and you get to where we are now.
You have 'lower class' people who can barely afford to rent the rich's assets, let alone purchase a home.
You have a 'middle class' weakening because their assets (their homes) are often sold in old age to pay for care or to help their children purchase their own homes. Their homes are then bought up by the rich, further shrinking the middle class.
Assets are finite so the rich use the rent to buy more and more assets, driving up the prices so lower classes can't afford to purchase any assets themselves, which perpetuates and deepens wealth inequality. The rich make so much money off this that they have 'passive incomes' so large they can't even spend it on just living, so they just use it to get more assets.
I think many people understand that this is the system and it works against everyone but the rich, but so many think that they might be one of the rich some day and so don't even acknowledge it, nor do they vote for it to change. Others can't believe that is designed this way and so are easily taken advantage of by the rich as they point at 'others' to blame.
Wealthy inequality just leads to more wealth inequality if no protections are brought in. Combine that with so many services being a 'rent' (subscription) and you get to where we are now.
You have 'lower class' people who can barely afford to rent the rich's assets, let alone purchase a home.
You have a 'middle class' weakening because their assets (their homes) are often sold in old age to pay for care or to help their children purchase their own homes. Their homes are then bought up by the rich, further shrinking the middle class.
Assets are finite so the rich use the rent to buy more and more assets, driving up the prices so lower classes can't afford to purchase any assets themselves, which perpetuates and deepens wealth inequality. The rich make so much money off this that they have 'passive incomes' so large they can't even spend it on just living, so they just use it to get more assets.
I think many people understand that this is the system and it works against everyone but the rich, but so many think that they might be one of the rich some day and so don't even acknowledge it, nor do they vote for it to change. Others can't believe that is designed this way and so are easily taken advantage of by the rich as they point at 'others' to blame.
I thought your comment was spot on, because it highlights that in the modern economy, unless you're in the upper echelons of earners, you aren't supposed to do anything for fun anymore. Your hobbies are encouraged to fuse with hustle culture to turn into another "grind" so you can monetize more of everything you do to try to survive. It's fucking gross.
The current economy feels like the late stages of an RTS where there is an obvious winner who is just consolidating their gains, picking off the weak, and running up the score.
Regarding the bolded:
I remember watching a BBC program many years ago, by a journalist who was covering the Greek riots back when they had that huge debt crisis. He posed the question "Why is it that people aren't raging against their governments more, if things are so bad?"
The conclusion? Well its been a while since I watched it, so this is hardly word-for-word, but basically, in the distant past, when the lower classes revolted, they genuinely had nothing, and they were getting nothing from those above them but misery. No food, no shelter, no clean water, no healthcare, no warmth. Nothing.
These days, a lot of what we take for granted is provided by the state and big businesses (granted its usually at a cost, but still..). We have electricity, running water, internet, transport, some form of healthcare and so on. If we decided to revolt, the government and/or big business could cut off the supply. At that point, how long do people last without running water? without the internet? without access to our online bank accounts?
For the lower classes to be willing to rise up and revolt, they have to have truly nothing, but right now we have a begrudgingly symbiotic relationship with those in power, rather than them being fully 100% parasitic.
I do agree with the sentiment, but I don't think 'Capitalism' is the problem. Human greed is the key issue and its much harder to remove.
That was my point. Thanks and thanks everyone backing me up and supporting me in previous comments as well.
My main point was that our thoughts are monetized - we're trying to find ways to make money off of every function and aspect of our lives: someday they'll find a way for us to mine crypto every time we breath through some lung GPU or something. and the reason I used podcasting is because as you said, our hobbies are now being pushed to become side hustles. Had a brother in law looking at my 80s collection one day and he was like "we gotta find a way to make this retro pop culture thing work for you. Maybe a podcast or eBay store selling vintage toys or something". My wife monetized her hobby out of need for money but thankfully she's walked away from that and now is making art for herself or her friends and it's like nature is healing here.
Last edited:
okay - but why did it work for centuries? one, and this is actually the smaller of the two reasons, there were far more resources and land that could be exploited for the benefit of a much smaller population. two, it relied on the exploitation of people in the form of slavery, colonization, genocide, child labor, and lack of regulation. early 20th century legislation and new government agencies protected consumers because capitalists would never have done it themselves. and i'm pretty confident in saying that since they had centuries to do it themselves and didn't.
the exploitation didn't go away after that. it was just outsourced to countries where there were no similar protections. and to help keep things going, more colonization kept happening in the form of government or corporate sponsored coups.
what we're seeing now is that the (mostly white) middle class who enjoyed the world built on the back of these exploited people are now feeling a bit of a pinch and want to return to the good ol days. that allows capitalists' good pals the right wingers to come in and tell them the reason the world feels different is due to [minority group here] actually having more rights than they, the people in the in-group do. tangent: this doesn't absolve white people or the in-group class of their responsibility. they're not otherwise kind and nice folk being tricked by evil capitalists and scummy right-wingers. they want to stay as part of the in-group and will believe anything that supports that.
