However those reserves of labour are largely getting tapped out. Wages for factory workers in China have been rising dramatically for a while now. There are other challenges coming , such as increased automation, but again that's not really directly the fault of capitalism. Meanwhile while wage growth has slowed, we've all benefited hugely from the cheap goods and services enabled by these changes. I really think it's much more about technological and demographic changes rather than capitalism per se. If anything, we've suffered from too much economic development, technological advances and global growth.
It's rarely as simple as supply and demand, but there seems to me to be a correlation between stagnant wages and large increases in the labor pool.
According to BLS-generated compensation cost indices,
total benefit costs for all civilian workers have risen
an inflation-adjusted 22.5% since 2001 (when the data
series began), versus 5.3% for wage and salary costs.The non-capitalist moves that stopped that nonsense were union moves, not socialistic or communistic.
> ... we'd still have voting as a reserved right for rich landowners. That's capitalism.
That's feudalism, not capitalism. It was democracy that undid that nonsense, not socialism or communism.
The rest of your rant shows that you are very bitter, but it does nothing to either enlighten or persuade.
Also capitalism is in no way in opposition to other individual freedoms such as unionism, liberal democracy, etc. You can have capitalism without them, just look at China, but I would argue that as a freedom, capitalism is most naturally aligned with other such personal freedoms.
As you point out rubber baron and oligarchic systems are based on suppressing freedoms, including often individual rights over capital. Corporate scrip isn’t capital, so clearly it’s iuse is actually anti-capitalist by restricting individual rights over capital.
The distribution of resources according to what will make the rich richer is not the best way. The private ownership of means of production is simply theft, there's no need for it and no moral justification.
Ultimately we're greedy by nature; capitalism rewards that greed, feeds it and deifies it.
I haven't set out to persuade you; if you seek to persuade yourself of what is just I have no doubt you will reject capitalism.
If I have some money, and you have some money, and I buy a tool and you buy some beer, I have a tool and you don't - so I'm stealing from you? [Edit: Note that the "means of production" can be as simple as a wrench, or a sewing machine, or a welder.] Step away from the marxist koolaid, you've had a bit much...
And you're only a half step away from theft yourself. Stating that "the private ownership of means of production is theft" leads almost inevitably to "therefore the public need to take back the means of production from those who have them". That's theft.
> I haven't set out to persuade you
You sure haven't. Stating as fact things that are completely outrageous from the other person's perspective is not a very good tactic of persuasion.
> ... if you seek to persuade yourself of what is just I have no doubt you will reject capitalism.
You should doubt. You should also find a better line; "if you really seek truth and justice you'll agree with me" is a manipulative cop-out. You want me to be persuaded? Make a convincing argument that makes sense to someone who doesn't already agree with you.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondragon_Corporation
I think it's disingenuous to think the only way workers can own the means of production is to take them from someone else.
"You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete."
I think it's disingenuous to think the only way workers can own the means of production is to take them from someone else.
"You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete."
But the toxicity of capitalism often stems from the polarized debate, I don't actually think many wants capitalism without regulation, or communism without free property rights... but it's hard to argue for the sane middle ground when you're attacked from both sides.