Not So Fast, Capitalism

The triumphalism of capitalism can sometimes be hard to take. Platitudes such as "A rising tide lifts all boats" abound, rarely questioned except by the most astute among us, thereby excluding much of the MSM.

Fortunately, there are still people like Linda McQuaig to set the record straight on a recent claim in the NYT that life just keeps getting better today:

Amid growing criticism of extreme inequality, expect to hear lots more about how today’s capitalism is benefiting the world — especially next week when the global elite meets for their annual self-celebration in Davos, Switzerland.

It’s a powerful narrative. If capitalism is working wonders for humanity, maybe it doesn’t matter that a small number of billionaires have an increasing share of the world’s wealth.

But is the narrative true?

McQuaig suggests something other than capitalism is at work that has improved people's lives:

Life expectancy only began to improve towards the end of the 1800s — and only because of the public health movement, which pushed for separating sewage from drinking water. This extremely good idea was vigorously opposed by capitalists, who raged against paying taxes to fund it.

So sanitation, not capitalism, may be humanity’s true elixir.

Indeed, things only truly got better, says British historian Simon Szreter, after ordinary people won the right to vote and to join unions that pushed for higher wages and helped secure public access to health care, education and housing — again over the fierce objections of capitalists.

This suggests that it’s not capitalism but rather the forces fighting to curb capitalism’s worst excesses — unions and progressive political movements — that have improved people’s lives.

This is not to imply, however, that advocates of unfettered capitalism are helpless against such onslaughts of insight. While public polling suggests widespread, growing support for greater taxation of the wealthy, they have a potent threat in their arsenal:

Don’t even think of taxing us, because we’ll just move our money offshore.

The antidote to such extortionate tactics is suggested by Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman, economists at the University of California, Berkeley, in their book, The Triumph of Injustice:

... they argue that advanced nations could effectively clamp down on tax havens if they co-ordinated their efforts, just as they do in other areas, like trade policy.

Saez and Zucman point out there’s nothing to prevent advanced nations from simply collecting the corporate taxes that the tax havens don’t.

Recent reporting requirements make this possible. “It has never been easier for big countries to police their own multinationals,” they argue. “Should the G20 countries tomorrow impose a 25 per cent minimum tax on their multinationals, more than 90 per cent of the world’s profits would immediately become effectively taxed at 25 per cent or more.”

As always, there are solutions to the ills that plague us. What is in short supply, however, are politicians with the vision, integrity and backbone to implement them.

If You Watch This Video

... you will realize very quickly that Ursula K. LeGuin is talking about much more than the writing of books:

A Good Question

But what is the answer?

Re: ‘Golden age’ for Poland caps 500 years of pain, Dec. 22

Seeing the statement “communism’s iron grip” was too much. What about capitalism’s iron grip? Communism has come and gone in Poland, Russia and many other countries. But we have endured capitalism for centuries and it shows no sign of abating.

It tells us that we live under democracy, when in fact we can do nothing to stop the actions of mean and disgusting people like Stephen Harper and Rob Ford, when binding treaties are negotiated without our knowledge, when we are not permitted to know when we are eating genetically modified food, when the poor get poorer while the rich get richer. Capitalism has resulted in climate change, of which there is no end in sight, other than the destruction of the world.

Our so-called “democratic” structures were set up centuries ago by the rich and powerful to attempt to make capitalism run smoothly, and, above all, to guarantee the system’s persistence. It has not run smoothly, but it has stayed in place.

How do we extricate ourselves from the iron grip of capitalism?

Ken Ranney, Peterborough

H/t The Toronto Star

A Refreshing Perspective

For the first time in decades, I feel a modicum of optimism about organized religion. The new Pope, Francis, is breaking the centuries-long stultification of the Church through the kinds of pronouncements that reflect its founder's beliefs and are long overdue. But with views like these, in which he lacerates the conventional wisdom about capitalism, I can only hope that he has a trusted taster for both his food and his drink.

My Political Philosophy

When I was teaching, I used to tell my students that one of the first things they should try to determine when evaluating a piece of non-fiction, whether a biography, autobiography, or essay, was the bias of the writer. Sometimes that bias can be inferred from the content of the piece, but other times it can be helpful to know something about the writer or the organization upon whose behalf he or she is writing.

For example, when reading an advocacy piece from the C.D. Howe Institute or The Fraser Institute, or an editorial from the National Post, it is fairly safe to conclude that the material reflects a very conservative, right-wing bias. Similarly, if reading something by Jim Stanford, an economist employed by the Canadian Auto Works, one Canada's preeminent unions, it is reasonable to infer a liberal, left-of-centre bias. Why are these distinctions important? They simply provide another tool with which we can evaluate material.

So to help anyone who may read this blog, I would like to articulate my own bias. As accurately as I can express it, I would have to say that in my political outlook is essentially middle of the road, or at the centre of the political spectrum, a position that at one time was very respectable, but now, unfortunately, owing to the polarization of politics that has accelerated under the Harper Conservative Government, has become the equivalent of being either 'wishy-washy' or leftist, perhaps too-polite terms if you read some of the labels that are regularly used on The globe and Mail website's Readers' Comments' section. I was initially going to say 'fair and balanced,' but unfortunately Fox News has given that phrase a very specific and odious connotation.

So what does being at the centre of the spectrum mean? For me, it means having a respect for each side's views, as long as neither is extreme. It means respecting the labour side of the equation, as well as the owners' side, i.e., the capitalist model. I draw the line, however, with unbalanced and extremist applications of either perspective. It is as anathema to me to say that all owners are simply fat capitalist exploiters of the workers as it is to tell me that the union model is dead, having outlived its usefulness. Both positions bespeak a kind of faith-based belief that permits no reasoned discourse in opposition to to their arguments/rants. In other words, I really don't have time for the kind of simplistic thinking that so often attaches to those platforms.

The question that has dogged me for so long, related to the above discussion, is: Why can there never seem to be moderation in contemporary politics and discourse? Why does one side so often seem to want to “win it all”? For example, if we study the history of the labour movement, the major impetus toward unionization was the frequently inhumane and dangerous conditions and hours of work under which people laboured. But why, other than thinking they could get away with it, did the owners seek to extract the maximum profit out of each employee at the expense of his health and life outside of work? Why could they not have been satisfied with reasonable profits from their investments? The obvious answer is that capitalism is all about the maximization of profit in order to promote even more entrepreneurship and investment; however, those making the decision to send five-year-olds into the coal mines were not principles, they were human beings. What is it then, that makes humans enslaved to a principle or belief, no matter the cost?

Or, on a related matter, why is reasoned discussion in our society so often trumped by cheap emotion, where demagoguery, if engineered sufficiently skillfully, can carry the day?

Are we really such flawed human beings?