I was intriged — not only by the post titled, The Unfathomable Stupidity of Rich White Men but one of the first comments that read:
Dear Fellow Readers, please share and spread this commentary far and wide.
It is the sharpest commentary I have read on recent U.S. history to date.
Wrong. The unfathomable stupidity is ours. These rich guys, white, black, or purple are the smart ones. We are the dummies.
What makes us so stupid? The fact that we think we understand capitalism. Even worse, we think that capital cares about capitalism. It doesn’t.
Capital cares only about one thing: getting more capital. That might involve some kind of capitalist construct but more likely it’s rent-seeking, cronyism, or even socialism, if that’s what makes money this week. It’s thievery, it’s dumping waste in the river at midnight, it’s cheating your contractors or borrowing to the gills before filing bankruptcy.
Why even bother with capitalism when capitalism requires work! Rent-seeking requires no work at all! Getting a no-bid contract to deliver facemasks at 10 times market value or ventilators for $45,000 when you’re buying them for $12,000 requires no capitalism at all! Hell, get a $1 million government contract to deliver ventilators and send them a bill for $10 million! It will get settled for $6 million and your congressman will brag about the $4 million he saved taxpayers!
Socialism? Sure! Taxpayer money used for anything is, at least by their definition, socialism. But if that’s where the money is, then today it’s socialism.
When the real estate market crashed in 2008 and again in 2021, who do you think is ready with all that tax cut cash — redistribution of wealth, not from the poor to the rich but plunging the country into trillions of debt and simply handing the money to billionaires...that is, after they’ve tithed back to the campaign chests of their benefactors?
If you guessed, rich white men, you’d be partially right — they’re rich, white, and mostly men, but they’re not just any rich white guy but the .001% of rich white guys. They’re the ones who got Trump’s $500B stimulus. They’re the ones not making millions but the ones saving billions from Trump’s tax cuts.
We see this in the form of wealth inequality. The top 10% controls 80% of total wealth in the United States, up from 73% in 2013. This leaves 90% of the population fighting over 20% of total wealth. It’s not hard to imagine that the top 10% will control 85% or 90% of total wealth!
As it is, the top 1% controls 50% of total wealth and that number will probably grow faster than the top 10%.
So when they have “enough” what will they do?
Run.
They will simply take the money and leave. Why bother with capitalism when there is no more money left to acquire? Why bother with capitalism when capitalism requires work? Why bother with that other shit capital does like rent-seeking or sucking off the government teat when you’ve literally drowned it in a bathtub?
When capital has got all the capital there is to get, they’re gone.
411: there is nothing we can “do” about it. Capital is gonna do what capital does. But I can think of only one thing that can prevent it.
Increase taxes on the rich and outlaw offshoring of profits.
Can you think of any better ideas? Put ‘em down.