Friday, September 02, 2016

My Experience of Counterfeit Capitalism

For most of my life, I've felt dog-eat-dog capitalism was unreasonable. Many people are born to difficulty, or temporarily weak. Others have huge advantages.

I've felt our communities should assist neighbors in need.

America's system of so-called free enterprise & market capitalism nonetheless provided some foundations for my life. Agree or disagree, it was a mechanism allowing calculated prediction and an underpinning for action. Somewhat understanding risks, everyday I made speculative choices based on a somewhat stable world view.

The bailout of 2008 changed my view of the world. Simply, the leadership elite bailed-out their friends, giving huge public funds to glaring, unmistakable losers (who were personally already wealthy), and absolutely undermined our system.

Bad managers should have lost their jobs: they were retained -- and rewarded.

Failed firms should have fertilized those enterprises more cautious & agile. Instead, the defeated status-quo were pushed forward, assisted by public money. It was a major & fundamental breach of global trade rules: American politicos gave state subsidies to prop-up chosen private enterprises. The dimension of accountability was shredded, torn-down, and subsequently ignored.
We had been forced to buy into the game of the Capitalist Pigs (where most of us are born disadvantaged); then, they suspended rules for their players, and assisted the recovery of our masters and overseers.

The toxic 1% helps itself.