The primary role of an economy is to facilitate the free flow of goods and services for the benefit of people who live and work within the society it resides. Very few would argue this simplistic but concise definition. Currently, most of the West functions within some form of State Capitalism operating under varying degrees of wealth distribution depending on the political party in power at the time.
The United States of America, the world’s current empire, is considered the epicenter of capitalism given its International currency status, dominant capital markets, Federal Reserve Bank and the inherent benefits generated from concentrated wealth and power. So, logic would reason, the country responsible for developing, managing and promoting an economic system that claims to provide the only solution to end poverty and enhance the development of mankind would represent an indisputable and illustrative example for the world to follow. Especially when it’s had more than seventy years of data to prove the point (post-World War two until the present).
So, let’s take a look.
Current economic statistics for the United States (The richest country in the history of the planet).
Obviously, not a very glowing report. If anything, these statistics provide plenty of reasons to avoid the US model if one had an ability to develop a country from scratch. Keep in mind, these results also include the additional riches gained from the global south through resource extraction and financial engineering during the previous half century.
So, what’s going on here?
After all, celebrated author Francis Fukuyama received glowing reviews from academia and the financial press with his proclamation that we need to look no further than free market capitalism to end the worlds socio economic struggles in his 2010 best seller, The End of History and the Last Man.
Well Francis, if you looked a little deeper, you might have found a flaw within the name of the system itself. C A P I T A L.
People tend to forget, or were propagandized to believe otherwise, markets are not exclusive to Capitalism. And I think we can all agree that properly regulated and functioning markets are one of mankind’s better inventions to produce goods and services at value. The problem arises when capital begins to dictate the direction of markets and the number of players interacting within. Throw in a narrowly focused, highly extractive and selective mechanism like Wall Street and you have all the elements of an insatiable greed machine that won’t stop until it implodes upon itself, destroys the habitat of which it relies for the products it produces and/or foments a revolutionary backlash from the people it commodifies. If you think I’m exaggerating, just reread the statistics above, study any peer reviewed scientific paper on industrial environmental degradation or the volumes of research documenting societal collapse upon the arrival of significant wealth inequality.
Which leads us to the primary focus of this post.
“We can either have Democracy in this country or we can have great wealth in the hands of the few, but we can’t have both”.
These were the prophetic and often quoted words of the United States Supreme Court Justice, Louis Brandeis. So, it comes with great irony and injustice that this very body of lawmakers, those who represent the final word on the law of the land, voted to grant corporations the same rights as an individual in a landmark ruling known as Citizens United (one of the most overt, Orwellian Double Think names ever invented). The 2010 ruling affectively granted corporations the right to spend freely on political candidates who favor their insatiable mandate to increase shareholders profits. And as always in the case of any pay to play system, laws were passed to benefit the highest bidder with a large majority of those laws in direct contrast to the will of the people.
So much for that thing about one person, one vote!
Of course, Citizens United represents the proverbial cherry on top of an already rigged system the owners created in the latter decades of the 20th century. One that destroyed labor and quality wages by off shoring jobs, indentured the middle class by massive deficit spending, looted the planet's resources while stealing the wealth of developing countries and bailed itself out to the tune of trillions, four separate times, during a 30 year run that represented zero wage increases for the hard working people of the country. And all of it, sold to the public under the slogan 'Trickledown Economics' when they knew very well it would accomplish exactly the opposite. And it did.
In a nutshell, capital was purposely created, selectively distributed and then redistributed via bailouts in an effort to consolidate power, direct laws and control the narrative. The net result, trillions of liquidity sucked out of the real economy and into the untaxable offshore accounts of the 1%. And to add insult to injury, they left you holding the 31 trillion dollar foreign debt bag.
Why?
Because that’s what capital has been designed to do.
And why capitalists hate competition. Or in the words of America's most celebrated Billionaire, JD Rockefeller, “Competition is a Sin”.
And this is how capital justifies something is evil as slavery or annoying as the collapsing space between your airline seats. Why your favorite appliance fails at just the wrong time and your expensive prescription medicine never solves the problem it was designed to mask. It's why big box retail crushes the independence/liberty of a small business person and ensures Middle East Wars linger for decades. And why an entire generation of workers became shackled with student debt in an effort to retain an expensive degree they were sold as an essential requirement to succeed.
I could go on but you get the point. Left unchecked, Capital is the new Monarchy, controlled by Oligarchs of its own creation and promoted by the media as our only savior.
We can continue down this path to the cliffs edge and ultimately return to the subservience of our forefathers or, open a public conversation about the predatorial nature of our current economic system and the many viable alternatives we can install to replace it.
You choose.
“Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.”
—John Adams
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