Capitalism
Full disclosure: I have lived in a capitalist society all my life and I've had a good life I think.
Capitalist society isn't particularly ancient in my reading.. 5 centuries ago feudal societies of various sorts were the norm all over the world. In feudal society the rulers considered themselves to be superior to the money grubbing merchants.
Over time the merchants got to be so rich that the kings were beholden to them. Merchants look at property as sacrosanct. Property is associated with liberty. A person with property could stand their own ground even against kings.
Capitalism seems to me to be distinct from that merchant wealth. Merchants prospered by trade while capitalists prospered by building things like factories and railways. And the people running the factories were called workers rather than peasants.
Capitalism has a strong whiff of natural selection. As in nature people in capitalist culture competed with each other with the 'strong' surviving and prospering. And the prosperity was real - Canada is a testament to that. But there were myths involved.
One myth was that the successful capitalist had manifested some sort of superiority that earned them their success. I think that luck is involved much more than they think.
Once I read of a computer program that simulated a free market economy that starts off with all players being equal and all transactions being free and uncoerced. By luck some players would gain a small advantage and do better in a deal. That advantage would put them in a stronger position for the next deal. It always ended up that some players grew much more powerful than the others. This was in a random simulation. None of the players were scheming against the others.
Reality is somewhat more complex but I think the lesson applies. Does anyone think that a Donald Trump or an Elon Musk actually earned their wealth the way I earned my paychecks? They are very lucky.
Successful people are prone to the illusion that luck had nothing to do with their success. They've earned their wealth.
I've watched Musk mushroom into the richest man on Earth. He's a genius in his own way - he sure knows how to raise money for his speculative ventures. And even if he sleeps in his office he's not the guy building a Tesla or a spaceship.
It seems that since Musk thinks he's earned his wealth that it's ok for him to spend it on quixotic projects like setting up a colony on Mars. Like all capitalists he controls a lot of wealth but he doesn't make it. Perhaps there are better things our society could do with that wealth.
To be honest - I really don't know. All of Musk's wealth is invisibly small against the social wealth of the people on Earth. Who knows what will grow from what he does? So far the outlook is grim.
The positive thing about capitalists is that they see an opportunity (like computers or steam engines) and invest in building those resources for long term profit. These days capitalists see future profits from draining wetlands to build data centers.
The logic of capitalism favours competition. But under the hood capitalism requires massive cooperation. Canada is certainly a capitalist country but capitalism wouldn't work without massive public infrastructure governed by the rule of law. Roads, schools, hospitals - all are essential for capitalism to work.
This leads to a certain tension in a democratic society. The capitalists learn pretty quickly that it is very profitable to manipulate politicians. Rather than compete to make the best widget the competitors turn their attention to corrupting the system.
When the Soviet Union collapsed a gangster state emerged with Putin in charge. People got to be very rich as long as they had his favour and tended to fall out of high windows when they displeased the boss. A gangster state is the result of unfettered capitalism.
The national debt in the USA tops 40 trillion dollars. That is often presented as government spending too much on frivolous stuff. It's been checked. Schools and healthcare and the military are not frivolous things
Capitalists benefit from the huge debt in two ways. The debt grows because the government's expenses are bigger than its income and so it borrows to make up the difference. The only reason the income is too small is that the rich aren't adequately taxed. Wanna guess who pushed for that sort of tax scheme?
Second - very wealthy people need a secure place to deposit their money. Turns out that USA bonds are considered one of the safest places to store wealth. As a bonus the bondholders get interest. payments.
Capitalists like automation. Machinery is a much more reliable resource for lots of things than human labor. You can plan maintenance schedules for machinery but not plan for a key worker whose child got sick. And an unspoken promise of automation was that the machines would do all the work and there would be nothing for people to do. Elon Musk boasted about that just recently.
Being rich Elon doesn't think of how to support himself without an income.
A world where everyone is freed of drudge labour could be a paradise but that's not the capitalist way. Instead the starving people were seen as a new and easily exploited resource.
What do you think?
I open the floor
I present regular philosophy discussions in a virtual reality called Second Life.
I set a topic and people come as avatars and sit around a virtual table to discuss it.
Each week I write a short essay to set the topic.
I show a selection of them here.