Branko Milanovic has much to say which is extremely enlightening. His work on whose incomes have risen as a result of globalisation – the elephant curve – puts to the sword the idea that it is only the rich who have benefited for example.
Unfortunately at other times his thinking betrays his Marxist roots:
… See MoreThese new markets are fragmented, in the sense that they seldom require a sustained full day of work. Thus commodification goes together with the gig economy.
It’s early in the day as yet but we’ll run with this as idiot statement of the day:
There is no ethical dissent under capitalism
The background is the Colin Kaepernick story, with Jay Z having signed a deal with the NFL to do something or other. So, with Kaepernick not having an NFL job – up to you whether you think it’s because of his activism or just whether he’s not quite a good enough player – we’ve that Jay Z deal to provide some cover from the activists.…
See MoreSome women are never pleased. Proof perfect that the feminist project has in fact won is seen as a terrible imposition of yet more of the patriarchy:
For the past 10 years, capitalism has been co-opting the language of sexual equality and feminism in order to sell us a new flavour of mass consumerism – keyrings in the shape of Venus symbols, mugs printed with Maya Angelou quotes, T-shirts sewn by women of colour in economically developing countries under slave conditions that say Women are the Future across the tits.
If we think over the problems that the wealth and income of capitalism have solved for us we’d have to conclude that it’s the most feminist socioeconomic system ever. It wasn’t the state that invented nor popularised the vacuum cleaner, microwave, disposable nappy nor washing machine. I’ve actually owned a Soviet washing machine and it was hardly a machine and didn’t wash*. It is all of this that has led to the economic liberation of women to all our benefits.…
See MoreThose with good memories might recall Eric Garner. He was selling “loosies” – single cigarettes – from untaxed supplies. At which point the police arrested him, during the course of the arrest he was put into a choke hold and yes, that does mean what it sounds like, whereupon he died.
Foul and appalling, clearly and obviously.
Then we get to peabrain theories – it was capitalism that killed him:
What’s been lost in this retrospective was Mr.
Peter Tatchell is a decent bloke, but he’s wrong here.
Our community organisations have become increasingly corporatised and exploited, with UK Pride parades often dominated by big business sponsors and floats, vote-seeking politicians and state agents such as the police, who brag about their LGBT+ inclusiveness but have not apologised or compensated us for their decades of oppression.
To paraphrase Joan Robinson, the only thing worse than gays being exploited by capitalists is gays not being exploited by capitalists.…
See MoreEconomics isn’t everything of course but when we’re discussing the structure of the economy it’s pretty much everything. Which makes the British left rather more than usually confused. For they’ve really not grasped the subject at all:
There is a dawning recognition that a new kind of economy is needed: fairer, more inclusive, less exploitative, less destructive of society and the planet. “We’re in a time when people are much more open to radical economic ideas,” says Michael Jacobs, a former prime ministerial adviser to Gordon Brown.
Around here we view mindfulness with the same attention and approval that we do Hare Krishna – not a lot but chacun a son gout. If it is necessary for you to pay £1500 to some git to tell you to slow down occasionally and think then so be it. The rest of us adults will just carry on with healthy and balanced lives all the same.
There are other critiques of the movement available of course:
The mindfulness conspiracy It is sold as a force that can help us cope with the ravages of capitalism, but with its inward focus, mindful meditation may be the enemy of activism.
A certain puzzlement concerning this argument from one of the more stupid Krauts:
Germany’s main centre-Left party has been rocked after one of its most prominent figures called for the country’s leading brands to be put under collective ownership. Kevin Kühnert, the leader of a Momentum-style grassroots movement in the Social Democratic Party (SPD), said German industrial giants such as BMW and Siemens should be owned jointly by their workers.
“There is nothing wrong with the BMW brand.
Originally published at Quora:
“Solve” wealth inequality? Presumably what is meant is lower it which is making some pretty large assumptions in itself. Why is it a problem that must be reduced?
But assume that we must reduce it for some unknown reason or another. One useful thing would be to reduce it the same way we did last time.
If you look at that Saez and Zucman work on wealth across time you can find an offshoot of their main paper which talks about the UK.…
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