What is capitalism and how can we destroy it? | Documentary

[Nemiel]

Reference Guide to Capitalism

The series is a comprehensive guide to capitalism first and foremost. It is not a propaganda series designed to agitate, it is a well sourced ‘reference video series’ that can be thought of as a textbook of sorts.

This is a 9 part series about Capitalism. Try not to get too hung up on the title.

Here's the full script for the series: http://online.fliphtml5.com/dyfu/jvty/#p=1

What is it?

Capitalism is a huge part of our everyday lives, there are those who support it and those who try to tear it down, it doesn’t matter which side you are on, they both have something in common – no one really knows what capitalism actually is and to what extent it affects our every action in society. It appears as though it is a given of every time since passed. In actuality however, it is relatively new and we are under the illusion that it is eternal, natural and the ‘only way’ to manage wealth and private property because ‘competition’ is natural.

Why would you want to destroy it?

This question comes up a lot. I responded to this question on one of my channels and this is what I said. I have posted it here so that I don’t have to keep on repeating it.

The title is rhetorical. The main problem with capitalism is that it has many untenable positions, it encourages consumption rather than conservation, it requires inequality and exploitation to function and it assimilates with opposing forms of life and recuperates itself by destroying cultures that try to operate in ways that don’t suit it’s requirements to function.

The idea of competition as a natural inevitability is blatantly false, once you look into modern understandings of ancient cultures, markets have in some ways always existed, but they were never a centralised operation to our lives, until around 300 years ago.

Finance is far outgrowing manufacturing, wages for manufacturing in the far-east are so low, it is impossible to compete with and not only that, but the east is becoming so powerful and robust, that it is vendor financing the west. If the east decides it can support itself as a core and periphery, then the western markets will collapse like dominos.

China has been very conservative, they have saved lots of money over the years and are on the cusp of becoming the dominant economy of the world.

When markets collapse and austerity measures override prosperity, wars break out in order to open new markets in arms manufacturing. If new forms of life develop that can offer alternatives to capitalism, they are quickly assimilated and enclosed through force and invasion. In order for it to keep going, we all have to keep wanting more and more stuff, but in order to do this, people have to get into debt, which could be a dangerous opening for a new market of debt labour contracts – people will be forced to work for next to nothing because the markets will come before human rights.

States have already become more and more privatised, social services are receeding and people are getting deeper into debt, which means there are massive bubbles ready to pop any time soon. You will have to watch the entire series in order to make up your own mind about capitalism, the first three episodes focus more on what capitalism is, rather than how or if it can be destroyed.

The fourth episode looks at the role of the state, the shift from Keynesian to neoliberal economics that have caused many financial crises over the years.

Then episode five shows the eternal recurrance of hundreds of years of bubble and crashes that capitalism has always been a heart of. Then the final 3 episodes focus on how capitalism breeds desires to consume more and more stuff, how we incorporate cultures around us, what other cultures are out there and why they always fail, then finally in the last episode I tackle some possibile ideas of how we can cultivate ways of life here and now that can offer an alternative to capitalism.

There isn’t a plan, or THE plan, it’s a matter of accepting that capitalism can’t coexist with anarchy, as it needs state power to back up claims of private property, no point taking over a state either, or supporting workers unions, syndicalist movements etc, as these quickly become hierarchical and swallow whole the capitalist ‘work ethic’.

If capitalism will fall, it will be because of many people acting in ways that counter its desires. It will be gradual and happening in small pockets of reistanace over time, but there will be no overnight revolution. That’s about all I can summarise here, you will have to watch the whole series in order to grasp my position further.

[Shinichi]

Students of economic subjects may also be interested in the lectures of economists like Mark Blyth and Richard Wolff, or The Hidden Secrets of Money series by Mike Maloney. The last series is especially educational for U.S. folks, since Maloney mainly discusses the functions of the U.S. system while Blyth and Wolff tend to discuss Capitalism and broader Economics in general.

And of course, there's always The American Dream Film. I love that thing. [razz]



~:Shin:~

[Daud]

Not sure if capitalism, or just decadent overreaching/overspending by the government in cooperation with multinational corporations which is symptomatic of societal collapse.

[Nemiel]

Not sure if capitalism, or just decadent overreaching/overspending by the government in cooperation with multinational corporations which is symptomatic of societal collapse.

Liberalism emerged with capitalism. In particular classical liberalism. It's rejuvenation for modern times is neoliberalism, which has all of the objectives of classical liberalism except for one thing - debt markets. Liberals have always aspired for 'slim state', or deregulated markets with little to no intervention by the government - the removal of Glass Steagal being one of the major deregulations in 1999, which kept investment banking and deposit banking seperate. Since the 2008 crash and the massive bailouts of the TBTF corporations, debts have been nationalised and this has given corporations increased control over government, implimenting austerity policies. Basically, the state is run like a firm and instead of taxation, it recuperates debt from the public - low taxation and negative rights.

Capitalism thrives only if private property is protected - which is the only function corporations will allow governments to use force for, if there is no government backing currency, there is no market, no value. Corporations are not symptomatic of societal collapse, societal collapse is caused by this aggressive corporate invasion.

Watch the series, as it shows exactly what capitalism is, how it functions and how liberalism, neoliberalism in particular, is untenable at the moment. Governments are not over spending,they are cutting funding in order to balance the books aftertaking on the bad debts of the banks, as the 'creed of growth' is the dominant ideology. Questioning what 'never ending production' means in terms of environmental problems to come is just crazy talk and considered the politics of envy,especially when the distribution of wealth is concerned.

Neoliberalism's ideological axiom is 'greed is good' and that inequality is 'virtuous', everyone gets what they deserve. This form of life has left us in a state of misery. It boasts at having conquered old 'isms' like racism and sexism, yet it lays the foundations for conceptions of intersectionality. This is where the radical social justice agenda has become so confusing, as it's been more about protecting the interests of the super rich and overseas markets that have put housing and employment out of reach for many. Insecurity and 'shocks' are what keep capitalism alive these days - for it to work, we have to keep wantingmore and more stuff and for that happen, and the reason why we have been seeing an improvement in the stadards of living is because of debt.More and more people have been getting into debt, especially since the sub prime scandal, where banks were lending to people with poor credit ratings, knowing that they would blow.

The party is over and vendor finance from China (which allows the Chinese to provide goods to the West as they don't have a middle class or consumer market - yet) could be taken away along with social welfare cuts, the rug is being swept away, many people will suffer and die because of this kind of market behaviour. Social progress was only possible because of cheap petroleum, but we are coming to the end of that too. The only way markets can be preserved in such a climate, is through war, wars 'open' markets.

To put it more simply - governments have the military and the military is the applications of force for corporations. Military and monetary get together all the time.

Government and corporations aretwo sides of the same coin - which is why I focused on capitalism.

[Daud]

Capitalism isn't inherently about debt, the banking system is. Capitalism is just private ownership of wealth. However, we do not have pure capitalism, we have crony, subsidised capitalism.

End the federal reserve, end government corruption and end populist entitlement and we will be on the path to glory once again. However, these things will not happen.

[Daud]

The real problem lies in fiat currency. We didn't have much of the problems we have now when the Dollar was supported by a gold standard.

Similarly in ancient Rome, the denarii was deliberately diluted with lead until by the end of Rome, it was only about 0.01% Gold.

If you can take the time to watch this documentary, it will let you know how corruption of sound money leads to destruction of true capitalism.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqvKjsIxT_8

I like many of the points you make though, they are well justified.

[Nemiel]

Capitalism is about profit - it's driven by the profit motive. Capitalism mutated in the 70's. Crony capitalism or neoliberalism, these are splitting hairs, just handy terms, but essentially we are talking about capitalism. Accumulation of private wealth is not the only aspect of capitalism, you have to include the profit motive.

Fiat currency (or more simply - printed money) is the concept of a future. Instead of mining materials, as resources are limited, the value of a currency is backed by a government. This was what I talked about earlier - capitalism requires the state, the state is always capitalist and it's the other side of the coin of banking. Banks, since they began, have always funded wars from the crusades to Iraq. In order to boost the value of the currency, you need oil and other valuable commodities, which means you need to go to war, so it's a two fold protection of private wealth (property) through Soveriegn bonds that can be traded and the military intervention abroad. Let's not forget the obcene profits that come from the debt markets here either. Taking away the federal reserve or other central banks would not solve the problems we face. Capitalists seek profit and these desires are dug in deeply (see below). It would stun growth, which to me is a good thing at least, but the markets would be so unstable that there is nothing to stop the IMF, the ECB or the Troika from stepping in to fill the role. Growth is easy to sell.

Fiat currency is a misleading term, the correct term is fiat banking. It's just the promise of value in the future, value backed by a government through bonds. The value of those bonds are secured by debt, securitisation. Theres just loads of IOUs circulating around. How do you reckon consumerism could continue if the currency had no value other than what it was worth when backed by a commodity? It would be worth next to nothing, as the IOU's far outweigh the money in circulation, the whole system would collapse, you would need a wheel barrow full of $100 bills to buy bread!

Central banks monitor the amount of money in the economy by measuring monetary aggregates such as M2. The effect of monetary policy on the money supply is indicated by comparing these measurements on various dates. For example, in the United States, money supply measured as M2 grew from $6.407 trillion in January 2005, to $8.319 trillion in January 2009. Commercial banks print the money, not the central banks.

In contemporary monetary systems, most money in circulation exists not as cash or coins created by the central bank, but as bank deposits. Commercial bank lending expands the amount of bank deposits.[5] Through fractional reserve banking, the modern banking system expands the money supply of a country beyond the amount initially created by the central bank, creating most of the broad money in the system.

There are two types of money in a fractional-reserve banking system: currency originally issued by the central bank, and bank deposits at commercial banks:

Central bank money (all money created by the central bank regardless of its form, e.g., banknotes, coins, electronic money)
Commercial bank money (money created in the banking system through borrowing and lending) – sometimes referred to as checkbook money

Securitisation and derivatives are the problem, and speculation. Lots of bad investments. Now lending has slowed to a crawl, central banks have negative interest rates to encourage lending, but the banks don't want to lendmoney to start up businesses as they prefer to pay interest themselves, even though the incentive is to lend. This is screwing up the economy, political instability doesn't help either.

I would go one step further than simply trying to destroy capitalism, I would go as far as devaluing the concept of economy itself. I would like to see a world where humans don't see the world as their property to be divided up and to instead live simpler forms of life that are more sustainable.

The biggest problem is one of desires. Even if the federal reserve was taken away and Soveriegn bonds were rendered worthless because securitisation and derivatives were outlawed, capitalist desires have been dug in so deep that we would probably recreate the current system in a very short time. Governments would still have debts, the chaos that would follow taking away a central bank overnight would be terrible.

The banks have control over governments - that's what neoliberalism is all about, capitalism has mutated. It doesn't matter if there is an 'ideal' form of capitalism, capitalism is untenable in its current form and the profit motive is one of the most destructive desires there is, if not the worst.

[Shinichi]

"Let's imagine you are a person looking for a job, and I the employer that you're looking to get hired by. So you come in and you sit down and fill out your application form, and I look at you and I describe to you the kind of work I'd like to have you do. You'll come nine to five, monday to friday, and you'll sit over there, and do this kind of work, etc etc. And we get through all that, and you're okay with that. And then we get to that big question of how much you're gonna get paid, and let's say we bicker back and forth, and we agree on $20 an hour. So I'm gonna pay you $20 an hour.

At this point (Karl) Marx enters with a smile on his face, and says 'I'm not gonna show you,' the reader of his book, 'that when that deal is done,' the $20 an hour, 'something is going on that you actually know, but you don't wanna face, but I'm gonna show it to you.'

When the employer, when I hire you for $20 an hour, I know that for every hour that you give me your work, your brains, your muscles to work, I'm gonna have more stuff to sell at the end of the day. Because you are added to my work force. You are going to help me produce more goods, or more services, or better quality goods and services, then I would have if I didn't employ you.

So I'm gonna say to myself, 'hm, it costs me to get (you) $20 an hour, what do I get out of it?' I'm going to have the output that (you) add by (your) labor. Now that has got to be more than $20, so the only way I'm going to hire you for $20 an hour, is if you produce more in the hour than I give you.

So when you feel in a vague way at the end of the day as you walk home that you're being ripped off, you're absolutely right. Or in Marx's language, exploited. "

Marxism 101 - How Capitalism is Killing Itself with Dr Richard Wolff

However, we do not have pure capitalism, we have crony, subsidised capitalism.

Capitalism is capitalism. No matter how "pure" you try to make capitalism, it will always end up exactly where it is today - with the 1% owning everything and the oligarchy ruling the government. Why? Because the fundamental nature of capitalism is the exploitation of the worker, by an employer who has family and friends ("cronies") that he wants to look out for.

Also, both of you (Daud and Nemiel) are half right and half wrong. It's not just about the politics, or just about the banks, or just about the economics. Any society is a combination of numerous factors, including any or all of those, and blaming the problems of a society on any one aspect (capitalism, neoliberals, the central banks) is just silly when the root problems are so much more complex than any of those things by themselves. Indeed, most of them are just symptoms.



~:Shin:~

[Nemiel]

I wasn't so much trying to blame on any one factor, they are just handy terms to explain things. My main aim here was to explain how finance works, not to reduce it as the only thing that matters. In the series I cover the way and economy works, how we produce and distribute goods and how comodificaton works, then the high seas of finance, the global division of labour, the state, financial crises, how capitalism is a culture, a history of capitalist desires, other cultures and economies besides capitalism and finally how to set out to create new forms of life that have a two fold aim of creation and destruction.

I can only respond to one point at a time but in no way would I ignore your points, they are the fundamentals of what we are talking about here - exploitation of the many by the minority - capitalists. This interpretation by Marx is probably the most important, then of course you can look into Weber on profit and Kieth Hart on power.

[Shinichi]

I wasn't so much trying to blame on any one factor, they are just handy terms to explain things.

The problem with handy terms is they have focused definitions, and thus leave out other things. For example, neoconservatives have just as many hands in the pot of modern politics as neoliberals (indeed, they have many more hands in the pot here in the U.S.), and that's besides other political forces moving as well



~:Shin:~

[Nemiel]

I wasn't so much trying to blame on any one factor, they are just handy terms to explain things.

The problem with handy terms is they have focused definitions, and thus leave out other things. For example, neoconservatives have just as many hands in the pot of modern politics as neoliberals (indeed, they have many more hands in the pot here in the U.S.), and that's besides other political forces moving as well



~:Shin:~

I see them as working hand in hand with each other, they both serve each others interests. It is better to speak of capitalism in a plural sense anyway, there have been many capitalisms.