Today 90% do not know the country is collapsing from under their feet. What we had from the 1940s - 1980s is long gone. No longer can 80% go out and find a job that allows them a working, living wage with Benefits to support a family. In fact, 40% cant do it with 2 working adults. What happened ? It is simple, yet those that changed the laws continue to cover up. They tell us : Misinformation, and disinformation: Which creates Moral hazards, distortions and delusions everything is fine. Treasury and Fed can spend and it is not a problem, it will work to stimulate the economy 0% interest rates and lower are good for the consumer and country. Covid-19 was blown out and really isn't a big deal. Debt is good, go by a home. Remember, when all else fails, the government will change the rules to fit the outcome, or artificial world that tells you, it isn't their fault, you failed, not the governments or banksters whom continue to grow their wealth. Asset inflation is good and cash out in home refi is now at 100B which the FED (a private bank has bought) The FED owns you. Things will get much much worse while each MAN, American ignores reality and lives by the Government Agenda which will make us a partial 3rd world nation equal to Brazil, Argentina, and many other countries would destroy their currency. https://matasii.com/macro-analytics-10-01-20-what-could-go-wrong-w-charles-hugh-smith/
There are 2 levels to this. You can make a claim, and then try to identify the causes. Even if it is true that "capitalism in a certain country is not working", that does not necessarily mean that capitalism (in general) does not work. To be logical. As one example to illustrate this, if a country is involved in a very intense war, pretty much any type of economic system it has is "not going to be working". Yes, it would technically be true to say "capitalism is not working" in this situation, but that would not carry the implication that ditching capitalism would at all be helpful, in this situation. So what I am saying is, maybe we should be identifying the more specific factors that seem to be causing the economic system in the US not to work, or to go haywire. Unless your implication was that the problem is the type of system itself (i.e. "capitalism") It's kind of like saying "My Ford car is not working". Does that mean something is specifically wrong within the engine of your Ford car, or does it mean that there is something inherently wrong with all Ford cars?
A common defense of capitalism in arguments like this is that capitalism just needs to be tweeked or that capitalism got us to where we are so capitalism is not a bad system. It completely ignores the fact that capitalism changes due to the pressure applied by the most powerful capitalists and their "needs". Hence there is no "going back" in a troubled capitalist system any more than there is a chance of removing the wealth and power of the wealthy and powerful. I'm not saying anyone here has made such arguments. I'm saying these are common mistakes made in the discussion of failing capitalism. Capitalism is in crisis around the world, and nowhere any more than it is in the USA. As capitalism has enriched leading capitalists, our capitalism has changed in response to them. And as I said, there is no going back. There is only forward-looking change if a resolution is to be peaceful. But our system has gradually increased the economic oppression of more and more people, and they are becoming more and more ready to act violently as we see in the protests, increasing prevalence of militia, calls for civil war, and threats of martial law. To prevent violence, I think we need to offer a real alternative, and to me that means organizing. History offers examples. In the 1920s and 30s there were very large and very popular communist parties and socialist parties and they were angry. They were also respected and seen as a cause for hope among the "downtrodden". And it is this popularity of those large organizations that FDR took advantage of to "persuade" leading and very wealthy capitalists that they need to submit to heavy taxation and socially-beneficial programs if they were to survive. The working class was organized and that organization gave people a real alternative and hope. And that prevented violence and any attempt at a violent revolution. But since FDR the leading capitalists have taken steps to prevent the working class from repeating such a challenge, and we are now left powerless and unorganized. And that puts us at the non-existent mercy of a capitalist class that is growing more and more desperate as capitalism erodes hope of their ability to continue "business as usual" and to continue to profit and accumulate more power.
Capitalism works better than a lot of other systems -- but that's damning with faint praise. In the 19th century we had industrial capitalism, which created a lot of wealth but gave a lot of it to landowners in return for doing nothing while still leaving enough for the productive: i.e., workers and investors in producer goods. Now we have finance capitalism, which also gives a lot of wealth to landowners in return for nothing, but gives about the same amount to banksters, IP monopolists, politically connected speculators, etc., in return for actually making things worse, leaving that much less for the productive.
Unions -- more specifically, union monopoly privileges -- are not the answer to privilege because they are not liberty or justice, merely countervailing privilege. That is the problem. The capitalist right does not offer us liberty, justice or truth, only subservience to privilege, and neither does the socialist left, only subservience to countervailing privilege.
The workers must change their unions. They need to eliminate policies that do not advance the cause of the working class and change borderline policies like seniority and selection of leadership.
Oh, I don't know. Unions at least help capitalists pretend that the only remedy for privilege is countervailing privilege, not liberty or justice.
They are established to enrich their owners and control people every bit as much as large corporations are.
Or external forces and pressure resulting from changes in government policy, such as Trade and Immigration.
Government ALWAYS serves the most powerful economic forces. You may find fault with certain policies in US politics but the function is ALWAYS to serve the economic, capitalist base, even when it looks superficially like the policy is harming the economics.
The reason people need two incomes to support themselves now is because people started two income households as a way to get ahead. The problem isn't capitalism. Capitalism did what it does quite effectively---adapted to the changing marketplace. A lot more available workers means you don't have to pay workers as much.
Yes, and it is a very good example of how the capitalist will always reduce workers' wages to the lowest cost which will keep them alive and keep them coming back to work out of dependency. When women became income earners and thereby made their households a two-income household, at first it made those households much more "solvent" and increased their disposable income, so lifestyles improved. But after 20-30 and more years of two-income households, inflation raised living expenses but wages didn't keep up. Capitalist saw lots of money that they could have had, going to those two-income households and they held wages flat in order to take back as much of that "excess" as possible. Now, households are reduced to the buying power they had long ago when there was mostly one income earner. Marx said the capitalist will only pay the worker what he must in order to keep the worker alive and dependent. And now we see he was correct.
Nonsense. The capitalist employer has no power to do any such thing. He must pay the market price for labor, and is therefore totally reliant on the landowner to force the worker into a weakened bargaining position by forcibly depriving him of access to alternative opportunities. That is why capitalist exploitation of workers had to await the enclosures of common land as private property, which forced formerly free peasants to seek employment in the towns or starve to death. That is a kindergarten-level economic analysis. The increased supply of labor simply forced its price down. This effect was fully explained over 140 years ago by Henry George in "Progress and Poverty." It doesn't matter if the labor force increases by births exceeding deaths, immigration, or increased participation by women: the effect will still be to force the margin of profitable land use outward, raising land rents and reducing wages strictly according to the Law of Rent. Capitalists have no power to hold wages flat. They must pay the market wage, which is determined by supply and demand. The supply of labor is determined by workers' access to other opportunities, and their wages equal their product on marginal land. They have more buying power, but it is absorbed by increased rents (and commensurate mortgage payments), as George proved. No, he was self-evidently, indisputably, and wildly wrong, as George proved. Most workers in advanced capitalist countries are paid far more than that. Their parlous financial condition is due to the fact that they have to pay landowners full market value just for PERMISSION to access economic opportunity. In the USA, they also have to pay exorbitant tribute to medical rent seekers, educational rent seekers, IP monopolists, etc.
They don't lower the wages to the lowest cost that will keep them alive. They lower them to the lowest cost that will keep their workforce staffed. The workers choose to work for that wage. If not, the employer would raise the wage until it found someone who would work for whatever new wage they came up with.
I've been in unions. They did nothing but enrich the owners and charged the union members the "extra" pay they received above the market rate in the area. And why would I go to you? As far as I'm concerned, your "knowledge" of unions is like a conservatives "knowledge" of the police. Fawning, worshipful, and extremely biased.
I think you have read enough of my posts to know exactly what I mean, It worked from 1930 - 1983 with little debt and proper tax classes, very little debt and or borrowing, real equality, and so so so much more that made for an AWESOME country. After that, we create ART Laffer and others HUGE tax cuts on Corps. and wealthy Individuals, deregulated for those very greedy Americans and now have a CAPITALISM that DOES NOT WORK. We now Print to give to the rich and allow the poor to borrow at 20% while the very Billionaires whom need for nothing can go to their friends at the FED, or related banks and borrow for .5% Basically what FDR did to create equality in the country has slowly been stripped away by the wealthy and greedy. They leverage the politicians, created super pacs, pass laws in the night. This isnt a right vs left issue. The right vs left is now basically a white vs colored, gay vs straight, abortion vs none. These are the things that Rupert Murdoch and other greedy scum keep in the news to keep people fighting amongst themselves while he, family, and friends pocket Trillions... How can it be that Amazon has paid near ZERO in tax for years, yet every small restaurant, lawn cutting business, pool cleaner, etc. have to pay 20 - 30% on 100k a year. While Amazon pays 0% on 800B in Revenue ? That is deregulation that is destroying the dollar, the working class, and all small businesses in America while China takes advantage of what we hand them. I dont blame them for accepting the business, only gullible Americans blame China for their growth. Do you blame the car mfg. for an auto accident when someone runs a stop sign ? No... But for Trump, it works because his Classless followers know no better. I am an Importer, when I started in 2005 everyone thought it was great, bring in cheap products for Americans... I knew then, what I know now, it is destroying the country. I said it in 1985 when Black and Decker was given the go ahead to do it. Reagans and Art Laffers angle was it was good for Americans because it allowed them to buy cheaper goods "saving money" The Capitalism we now have it not a real capital system, it ids Print, borrow, give away and HOPE FOR THE BEST outcome while we raise the debt ceiling..... Failure !
You are 100% wrong. I get it, thousands are paid to post drivel online. When we had Unions and forced Good pay and Benefits are the Overlord Business owners, things got much better. Once we started removing Unions and forcing the Very Rich to pay a good wage and benefits things got much worse. It is that simple. But today, we have the internet for people to SPREAD false angles, like yours... If you had to sit down in front of 500 workers who were making 12/hr. while the owner had 20 homes, 50 cars, and billions in the bank I think your mouth would spew something completely different. Today the greedy turds can hide... Back then, they couldnt. It will all cycle back around as the country falls into a depression. It will take 20 or 30 years for sure. what we have done since mid 80s is strip the wealth from the working class and give it to the rich, nothing more than stealing via deregulation and tax cuts, also hiding real inflation.