5 ms·

Surprised to find this here, not surprised that there are no comments. >The COVID pandemic has triggered a new crisis in capitalism, but capitalism’s underlyin

by fnovd 4y ago

Surprised to find this here, not surprised that there are no comments. >The COVID pandemic has triggered a new crisis in capitalism, but capitalism’s underlying tendencies leading towards such crises are not new. >In a way, Roberts reckons nothing has really changed. In the post-COVID world, the intensification, through digital media, of productive and unproductive labour processes continues. In other words, exploitation and oppression in the paid workplace is still the dominant method employed by capitalists to extract a surplus from their workforce. >A Marxist theory of digital technology, labour and work must therefore begin with the premise that the labour process is part and parcel of the capitalist mode of production and the creation of surplus value through alienated labour. So, everything is new, but it's also the same. Really deep stuff. You can tell that someone with decades of experience in Marxist Economics wrote this flowery and meandering piece. Upon reading it, I truly felt as though I had read something that someone had written. There's so much emotional investment into the idea that everything is terrible and falling apart, you can feel the urgency with which the modern world is reframed into a familiar context of good versus evil. Don't worry, even the world has shifted in unpredictable and unforeseen ways, our dearly-beloved, cryptically tautological, and relentlessly self-referential epistemology of economic philosophy is still perfectly suited for the task, as it has been since the days of pre-historic tribal socialism.

joe_the_user 4y ago
There's so much emotional investment into the idea that everything is terrible and falling apart, you can feel the urgency with which the modern world is reframed into a familiar context of good versus evil... Or maybe you can look at the average worker is one pay check from disaster, that the American expectancy has been declining for several years and maybe the recent changes look more like things that reinforce the problems. Notably, the biggest issue for rail workers in the recent dispute wasn't sick days or pay but "precision crew scheduling", a system that involves workers being on call for nearly hour of the day, for nearly every day of the year. [1] The Marxist picture of an evil capitalist villain fits both the rail road companies and Elon Musk pretty well lately. If they don't want it pinned on them, maybe they should change their behavior. [1] https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/11/rail-strike-why-the-railroads-wont-give-in-on-paid-leave-psr-precision-scheduled-railroading.html https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/11/rail-strike-why-the-...
- fnovd 4y ago
  If that's what you want to believe, you will always be able to find another blog to reinforce that view. In fact, that's almost exactly what you did; you found another article that paints America as one bad coin-flip away from a dystopian hellscape (if it isn't one already). Just look at the first sentence: >For months, the world’s largest economy has been teetering on the brink of collapse because America’s latter-day robber barons can’t comprehend that workers sometimes get sick. We learn so much from this trite piece of... journalism. 1. We're on the brink of collapse (again!) 2. We're living in a new era of robber-barons 3. The people running things are idiots have no idea that people get sick, unlike the very smart author of this article Meanwhile, in reality, the "crisis" spelled out in the article was resolved in a predictably political (and boring) way. That kind of news doesn't fuel clicks, though. In its staunchly dogmatic opposition to modern capitalism this kind of journalism can't avoid embracing the exact business model it pretends to decry: clicks go up, journalism more better.
  - unity1001 4y ago
    > narrow definition of what "programming" is compared to what it has become. Its not a matter of 'belief'. Its a matter of mechanics: The companies that dont abuse their employees and customers like that get let behind by those who do to get the most market share and profits. Eventually getting either pushed out of the market or gettin bought-out. The mechanics of the system encourage, reward and enforce sociopathy. Anyone who doesnt out-sociopath others is eliminated from the game.
- drewcoo 4y ago
  > If they don't want it pinned on them, maybe they should change their behavior. That's not really their modus operandi. They're more likely to buy up all the pins. And the means to produce them.
Guthur 4y ago
It's not very complicated. Wealth has a tendency to accumulated, it's very addictive. And now that we have reclassified usury as productive it has got even worse. We not only count it as productive but often give preferential tax treatment. Our tax systems have become a perverse inversion where we tax the poor to enrich monopoly cartels.
- nomel 4y ago
  > Our tax systems have become a perverse inversion where we tax the poor to enrich monopoly cartels. Could you expand on this? Naively looking at the details on the federal tax revenue, I'm having trouble understanding: https://taxfoundation.org/publications/latest-federal-income-tax-data/ https://taxfoundation.org/publications/latest-federal-income... A chart, by income: https://files.taxfoundation.org/20220119175703/FedData2022_1.png https://files.taxfoundation.org/20220119175703/FedData2022_1... Some relevant conclusions: "The bottom 50 percent of taxpayers (taxpayers with AGI below $44,269) faced an average income tax rate of 3.5 percent." "In 2019, the top 1 percent of taxpayers accounted for more income taxes paid than the bottom 90 percent combined. " "The top 1 percent of taxpayers (AGI of $546,434 and above) paid the highest effective income tax rate of 25.6 percent—more than seven times the rate faced by the bottom 50 percent of taxpayers."
  - Guthur 4y ago
    Much of the wealth that is really at the top is capital gains or can be offload onto offshore entities. When you are really rich it's not income tax you are trying to avoid rather it's about protecting the vast wealth you've already accumulated via asset inflation. And then we could talk about the largely regressive nature of sales tax. Taxing income is actually a perversion as well, why should we be taxing actual productive actively when it's wealth we are looking to redistribute. Tax the accumulate wealth not the income.
    - nomel 4y ago
      How does taxing wealth work, without eating away at the savings of the middle class? If wealth can't be stored, then won't they be forced to participate in labor, continuously? For example, I have some shares that I'm holding onto for retirement. They should some unsubstantial gains that are a little over inflation, per year. If I'm taxed on those, then the concept of "long term investments" seems to go out the window, requiring shorter term gains. Wouldn't both of these just act as an amplification for, what many perceive as, the shortcomings of capitalism? Or, maybe a progressive tax? Or, do you think a completely different system is required? If you haven't noticed, I am very uneducated on these types of things, so be gentle. :)

by fnovd 4y ago

joe_the_user 4y ago

There's so much emotional investment into the idea that everything is terrible and falling apart, you can feel the urgency with which the modern world is reframed into a familiar context of good versus evil... Or maybe you can look at the average worker is one pay check from disaster, that the American expectancy has been declining for several years and maybe the recent changes look more like things that reinforce the problems. Notably, the biggest issue for rail workers in the recent dispute wasn't sick days or pay but "precision crew scheduling", a system that involves workers being on call for nearly hour of the day, for nearly every day of the year. [1] The Marxist picture of an evil capitalist villain fits both the rail road companies and Elon Musk pretty well lately. If they don't want it pinned on them, maybe they should change their behavior. [1] https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/11/rail-strike-why-the-railroads-wont-give-in-on-paid-leave-psr-precision-scheduled-railroading.html https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/11/rail-strike-why-the-...

fnovd 4y ago
If that's what you want to believe, you will always be able to find another blog to reinforce that view. In fact, that's almost exactly what you did; you found another article that paints America as one bad coin-flip away from a dystopian hellscape (if it isn't one already). Just look at the first sentence: >For months, the world’s largest economy has been teetering on the brink of collapse because America’s latter-day robber barons can’t comprehend that workers sometimes get sick. We learn so much from this trite piece of... journalism. 1. We're on the brink of collapse (again!) 2. We're living in a new era of robber-barons 3. The people running things are idiots have no idea that people get sick, unlike the very smart author of this article Meanwhile, in reality, the "crisis" spelled out in the article was resolved in a predictably political (and boring) way. That kind of news doesn't fuel clicks, though. In its staunchly dogmatic opposition to modern capitalism this kind of journalism can't avoid embracing the exact business model it pretends to decry: clicks go up, journalism more better.
- unity1001 4y ago
  > narrow definition of what "programming" is compared to what it has become. Its not a matter of 'belief'. Its a matter of mechanics: The companies that dont abuse their employees and customers like that get let behind by those who do to get the most market share and profits. Eventually getting either pushed out of the market or gettin bought-out. The mechanics of the system encourage, reward and enforce sociopathy. Anyone who doesnt out-sociopath others is eliminated from the game.
drewcoo 4y ago
> If they don't want it pinned on them, maybe they should change their behavior. That's not really their modus operandi. They're more likely to buy up all the pins. And the means to produce them.

Guthur 4y ago

It's not very complicated. Wealth has a tendency to accumulated, it's very addictive. And now that we have reclassified usury as productive it has got even worse. We not only count it as productive but often give preferential tax treatment. Our tax systems have become a perverse inversion where we tax the poor to enrich monopoly cartels.

nomel 4y ago
> Our tax systems have become a perverse inversion where we tax the poor to enrich monopoly cartels. Could you expand on this? Naively looking at the details on the federal tax revenue, I'm having trouble understanding: https://taxfoundation.org/publications/latest-federal-income-tax-data/ https://taxfoundation.org/publications/latest-federal-income... A chart, by income: https://files.taxfoundation.org/20220119175703/FedData2022_1.png https://files.taxfoundation.org/20220119175703/FedData2022_1... Some relevant conclusions: "The bottom 50 percent of taxpayers (taxpayers with AGI below $44,269) faced an average income tax rate of 3.5 percent." "In 2019, the top 1 percent of taxpayers accounted for more income taxes paid than the bottom 90 percent combined. " "The top 1 percent of taxpayers (AGI of $546,434 and above) paid the highest effective income tax rate of 25.6 percent—more than seven times the rate faced by the bottom 50 percent of taxpayers."
- Guthur 4y ago
  Much of the wealth that is really at the top is capital gains or can be offload onto offshore entities. When you are really rich it's not income tax you are trying to avoid rather it's about protecting the vast wealth you've already accumulated via asset inflation. And then we could talk about the largely regressive nature of sales tax. Taxing income is actually a perversion as well, why should we be taxing actual productive actively when it's wealth we are looking to redistribute. Tax the accumulate wealth not the income.
  - nomel 4y ago
    How does taxing wealth work, without eating away at the savings of the middle class? If wealth can't be stored, then won't they be forced to participate in labor, continuously? For example, I have some shares that I'm holding onto for retirement. They should some unsubstantial gains that are a little over inflation, per year. If I'm taxed on those, then the concept of "long term investments" seems to go out the window, requiring shorter term gains. Wouldn't both of these just act as an amplification for, what many perceive as, the shortcomings of capitalism? Or, maybe a progressive tax? Or, do you think a completely different system is required? If you haven't noticed, I am very uneducated on these types of things, so be gentle. :)