'Neoliberal capitalism' has contributed to the rise of fascism, says Nobel laureate
'Neoliberal capitalism' has contributed to the rise of fascism, says Nobel laureate
The attacks on democracy and freedom "have never been greater in my lifetime," warns Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz.
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/19046336
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Exactly, capitalist markets are really good at extracting resources from the land and labour from the people to make a profit, they just don't know where to stop until it's too late, unless they are regulated.
They're also getting increasingly more efficient at funneling profits to the top, rather to the greatest value producers: labourers. This is wage theft. Get it all the way to 100% and you have slavery.
Though important to note that slavery does not just meant you don't get paid. Though I don't think anyone needs a splainer on that.
extracting resources from the land and labour
You're trying to paint production in a negative way, while in reality competitive markets converge to most fair prices
Law of supply and demand dictates that too low wage will fail to attract workers, while too high wage will result in product that is too expensive and won't attract customers willing to buy.
It's a beautiful, self regulating communication network that pays well for stuff that is in demand and pays little for things nobody wants
No, it is you who are seeing the world as just markets, as if markets is what produces wealth, as if labour were just a pesky cost that you can't get rid of.
As the pandemic showed, it is workers that produce wealth and are essential. Markets have their place, but need to be controlled so they don't kill the people who power them.
Also: markets fail very often when the incentives and structure are not aligned with the socially desired outcomes.
workers that produce wealth and are essential
You got it wrong - workers alone won't produce anything. You need everything: Workers, managers, accountants, capital, financial system, machines, supply chains, logistics, customer acquisition and so on. Each one of these parts is crucial - wealth is only produced if all those elements are correctly allocated.
Half of these things are provided by separate companies, which have their own complex structures, that together create wealth producing market environment.
"I'm a worker so I produce wealth!" Is a harmful simplification. Skilled worker without all that backend isn't worth a jack shit. This is why there're so huge wage disparities between poor and rich countries - workers may be equally skilled, but the backend that supports the work in the poor country simply doesn't exist.
markets fail very often when the incentives and structure are not aligned with the socially desired outcomes.
There're corner cases that cause issues - but this is why we have legal framework to fix them - antitrust laws, regulation of relations between employee-emplyer, consumer protection, green energy incentives and so on
I agree all of that is needed to produce products in a modern economy, but I disagree with the share of profit allocated to managers. The only reason the allocation of profit is so skewed is because the manageriat abuses their power. They are supposed to be enablers of productivity, not little tyrants.
You're missing the part of the picture: There are also workers with specific skill sets who are paid extremely well. You don't hear about them, because they don't complain.
But the question is why? Why workers with certain skills really well paid, while others aren't?
The answer is misalignment between availability of types of work, and availability of workers with appropriate skills.
There's no magic solution that would fix this - core issue is education system that produces surplus of one type of skilled workers and not enough of other types. The end result are huge wages for rare skills, and very low wages for common ones
Fixing that problem requires radical reform of how people pick their career patch and it would take many years for benefits to have impact.
No, I'm saying people need to be paid a living wage to keep the social peace. You may externalize that responsibility from your enterprise, but someone is going to have to address the mismatch between wages and cost of living.
You want an economy that rewards the 10% best, that is good I guess...but the inevitable 90% of "losers" that are still essential for production will get out of your control if you keep punishing them and forcing them into a race they never win (particularly when the social elevator breaks and poverty becomes transgenerational)
someone is going to have to address the mismatch between wages and cost of living.
Everything in "Cost of living" basket is delivered by the same economy that tends towards reduction of prices - assuming it's healthy competitive market. I believe that at least in case of US, housing market and Healthcare are particularly corrupted, which drags prices up.
but the inevitable 90% of "losers"
I don't believe there are 90% of "losers" if you said bottom 10-20% earners in the society, I'd might agree - there's always some percentage of people who can't make the ends meet.
Law of supply and demand dictates
This is the economic version of "assume a spherical cow in a vacuum." An economic "law" is an idealized description of how things work when there are no confounding factors, not a rule the real world is compelled to obey. It turns out the real world is full of confounding factors that make the law too unreliable to predict—or even admit—things the rise of fascism.
It's a beautiful, self regulating communication network
On paper yes, but Jesus Christ, look around you. It's only beautiful if you overlook its fatal flaws.
You really live in an imperial bubble.
Colonial capitalism captures countries in one way or another and keeps wages depressed in those countries so that the finance sector can extract wealth. Non-wealthy people in the imperial core live in relative privilege off the table scraps.
Your argument only works when you forget about the rest of the world and discount imperial hegemony.
Too low wage and the government will top up those being underpaid by their employer, effectively passing on part of the burden of pay to the tax payer.
If wages rise too high, the government will always step in to make sure it doesn't continue.
Its highly externally regulated and ultra manipulated by the people who buy labour and own for their money. Sadly, some people still beleive in the "invisible hand" blessed be its name story.
If wages rise too high, the government will always step in to make sure it doesn't continue
What do you mean by that? If you mean progressive taxation then I agree - IMO this is an inevitable result of democracy - in particular one citizen one vote rule.
Progressive taxation of middle class and spending that money on benefits for poor is a way of buying votes. If you can buy multiple votes of poor people at expense of one middle class vote, it's a winning strategy.
Progressive taxation is fair: someone who makes 0 from the way society is structured pays 0, because the system is clearly not working for them. Someone who makes the average wage contributes accordingly, but they are not a winner. People who are doing very well are paying a premium to society for creating the conditions for them to be doing so well.
Too bad that when you go even higher the effective tax goes down again due to all sorts of accounting tricks and outright evasion.
Pesky voting rights! For too long have the ultra wealthy had to suffer under the dictatorship of the majority. Votes should cost money and there should be no limit to how many you can buy.