Capitalism is all of about 200 years old. It's a revolutionary idea. Previously, if a group of people wanted to pool capital for a venture, they had to have the support of the state or the church, usually one in the same. The US allowed for the pooling of capital for ventures that were purely for profit. The result was the rapid expansion of the country.
But that's the initial effect of a system that's relatively brand new. Now we're facing the constant conglomeration of ownership of capital, resources, and production. We used to push back against the monopolization of industry but we're losing that battle. And as anyone who's played a lot of Monopoly knows, it never ends well.
Capitalism results in many improvements, such as funding for research towards medicines that impact millions of people around the globe. However, capitalism overlooks many improvments such as funding research of medicines that only effect a few people - because that's not profitable enough.
The biggest failure of our model of capitalism thus far is that we have allowed the corporate takeover of our political system. Laws are now crafted by corporate lawyers and politicians spend all of their time raising more campaign funds for the next election cycle. Anyone we would actually want to vote into positions of leadership are overshadowed by corporate-sponsored puppets.
A democracy can not function without an informed populous. Our populous is informed by one of few corporate owned and controlled media channels. Since the telecommunications act of 1996, the quality of news reporting has plummeted and now pushes one of 2 available narratives, both equally fabricated.
Yes, capitalism was an amazing evolutionary step in society. But if we don't take the next step forward soon, we'll be taking a step backwards.
I don't see why the next step can't be more capitalism. The private ownership of property and the investment structure as it exists has resulted in billions of people being lifted out of poverty. Why wouldn't we want to continue doing that? Because people in America saw a relative decrease in buying power over a generation? Is the rest of the world supposed to stop improving the lives of their citizens?
But that's the initial effect of a system that's relatively brand new. Now we're facing the constant conglomeration of ownership of capital, resources, and production. We used to push back against the monopolization of industry but we're losing that battle. And as anyone who's played a lot of Monopoly knows, it never ends well.
Capitalism results in many improvements, such as funding for research towards medicines that impact millions of people around the globe. However, capitalism overlooks many improvments such as funding research of medicines that only effect a few people - because that's not profitable enough.
The biggest failure of our model of capitalism thus far is that we have allowed the corporate takeover of our political system. Laws are now crafted by corporate lawyers and politicians spend all of their time raising more campaign funds for the next election cycle. Anyone we would actually want to vote into positions of leadership are overshadowed by corporate-sponsored puppets.
A democracy can not function without an informed populous. Our populous is informed by one of few corporate owned and controlled media channels. Since the telecommunications act of 1996, the quality of news reporting has plummeted and now pushes one of 2 available narratives, both equally fabricated.
Yes, capitalism was an amazing evolutionary step in society. But if we don't take the next step forward soon, we'll be taking a step backwards.