The end of capitalism as practiced today might be a good thing. Bernie Sanders and others here in the US have advocated socially responsible capitalism for decades, where corporations are NOT people, they are responsible for the environmental havoc they cause, they pay living wages, they cannot write laws for politicians (mainly Republic…
The end of capitalism as practiced today might be a good thing. Bernie Sanders and others here in the US have advocated socially responsible capitalism for decades, where corporations are NOT people, they are responsible for the environmental havoc they cause, they pay living wages, they cannot write laws for politicians (mainly Republicans) who pass them to favor the corporations at the expense of workers and society, on and on. Of course, the greedmongers call this socialism.
Both of our countries need another FDR - widely hailed as a socialist by greedy capitalist types, but who gave us an Economic Bill of Rights, the New Deal, Social Security, and many other programs that helped the common folk ignored by greed. What will it take to make society work for "the least of us?" Jesus' concern for the poor and sick means little to our supposedly Christian nations.
"This American Life" had several in-depth programs on the causes of the Great Recession, including the windfall for investors like Steve Mnuchin who eagerly bought up foreclosed homes caused by fraudulent lending practices. I can't believe you in the UK can't get a fixed 15- or 30-year mortgage! The US had Adjustable Rate Mortgages (ARMs) in the 1970s and 80s and it was devastating. My husband and I bought our first house in 1979 at 10.5 percent interest with a VA loan (and rates quickly went up to 14 percent). I bought my current home at 3.5 percent, and now mortgage rates are around double that. Housing prices have mushroomed, thanks in large part to investors who rent them out or turn them into AirBnBs.
The old adage holds true. The rich get richer, and the poor get poorer. What will it take, short of a French Revolution-style uprising?
I don't know what it will take to stop this race toward concentrating all the wealth at the top. Thomas Piketty's data shows that we repeatedly go through a cycle where wealth moves to the top, wealth inequality reaches a certain point, and then some calamity causes a reset. The calamity is usually war, but it can be something else like a plague or financial collapse. During the reset, a lot of wealth moves back down to the middle layers of society (not to the poor). Then the elites at the top start pulling it back to themselves and we start the cycle again.
Concentration of resources had become so extreme by the early 20th century, the two world wars with the Great Depression in between were essentially a single spectacular reset event. We seem to be around the point in excessive concentration where that kicked off.
Capitalism the way it's being done is taking us to a very dangerous place. What Americans think of as socialism is nowhere near the way the rest of the world defines that term. I wouldn't want to go for the flavors of it that have been most prominent so far (e.g. Marx or Stalin). But capitalism without sufficient guard rails is a path to disaster and widespread misery, and something along the lines of democratic socialism looks worth a try... if we can get there. Don't know how we can do that.
The end of capitalism as practiced today might be a good thing. Bernie Sanders and others here in the US have advocated socially responsible capitalism for decades, where corporations are NOT people, they are responsible for the environmental havoc they cause, they pay living wages, they cannot write laws for politicians (mainly Republicans) who pass them to favor the corporations at the expense of workers and society, on and on. Of course, the greedmongers call this socialism.
Both of our countries need another FDR - widely hailed as a socialist by greedy capitalist types, but who gave us an Economic Bill of Rights, the New Deal, Social Security, and many other programs that helped the common folk ignored by greed. What will it take to make society work for "the least of us?" Jesus' concern for the poor and sick means little to our supposedly Christian nations.
"This American Life" had several in-depth programs on the causes of the Great Recession, including the windfall for investors like Steve Mnuchin who eagerly bought up foreclosed homes caused by fraudulent lending practices. I can't believe you in the UK can't get a fixed 15- or 30-year mortgage! The US had Adjustable Rate Mortgages (ARMs) in the 1970s and 80s and it was devastating. My husband and I bought our first house in 1979 at 10.5 percent interest with a VA loan (and rates quickly went up to 14 percent). I bought my current home at 3.5 percent, and now mortgage rates are around double that. Housing prices have mushroomed, thanks in large part to investors who rent them out or turn them into AirBnBs.
The old adage holds true. The rich get richer, and the poor get poorer. What will it take, short of a French Revolution-style uprising?
I don't know what it will take to stop this race toward concentrating all the wealth at the top. Thomas Piketty's data shows that we repeatedly go through a cycle where wealth moves to the top, wealth inequality reaches a certain point, and then some calamity causes a reset. The calamity is usually war, but it can be something else like a plague or financial collapse. During the reset, a lot of wealth moves back down to the middle layers of society (not to the poor). Then the elites at the top start pulling it back to themselves and we start the cycle again.
Concentration of resources had become so extreme by the early 20th century, the two world wars with the Great Depression in between were essentially a single spectacular reset event. We seem to be around the point in excessive concentration where that kicked off.
Capitalism the way it's being done is taking us to a very dangerous place. What Americans think of as socialism is nowhere near the way the rest of the world defines that term. I wouldn't want to go for the flavors of it that have been most prominent so far (e.g. Marx or Stalin). But capitalism without sufficient guard rails is a path to disaster and widespread misery, and something along the lines of democratic socialism looks worth a try... if we can get there. Don't know how we can do that.