How Capitalists Argue In Bad Faith.
Whether you’re making the argument or rather hearing it, the vast majority of defences for Capitalism boil down to two points.
The System is good.
The People are good.
I didn’t say “defences for Capitalism boil down to ONE OF two points”. That is because a habit that is easily seen from any proponent of Capitalism is in a state Quantum Fluctuation.
The term from Quantum Physics, where light is both energy and a particle, but collapses into one or the other once observed. This is the same in Quantum Computing; a data point is computed both as a 0 and 1 until it collapses. Nearly all arguments in defence of capitalism follow this same principle to explain the gains and losses whenever beneficial.
Let’s play out a scene between a Capitalist and those who criticise the ills of it.
Capitalism is responsible for all the goods you enjoy. Your phone, your technology, your comforts. To criticise it is to be a hypocrite.
If that is the case, shouldn’t we ensure the preservation of the system by ensuring that there is a base line of wealth for the poorest among us so that they may help support it through economic activity and buying power, by asking those who have benefitted the most to forgo a portion of their wealth, which they owe to this system.
Those people are the reason capitalism work. We owe Capitalism to those people, and they should benefit from their own hard work, and encourage others to work hard.
Then we should ensure there are as many innovators and hard workers as possible and ensure that anyone who wants to succeed should be able to, whether by offering Basic Income so they have the time to pursue their own talents and interests, education so they may be knowledgeable and informed on how to benefit everyone and themselves, and health care so no would-be inventor or CEO is stopped by acts of God. This would still required a redistribution of wealth.
That would interfere with the system. Capitalism works best when it’s left untouched, unencumbered, and undisturbed. That is how you get true meritocracy.
So you agree then that bad faith actors, people who rig stock markets and inflate prices, lay off workers and cut wages and benefits, offshore profits and horde money are upsetting the system of Capitalisms that otherwise would be working well. The reasonable response would therefore be to put regulations on the actions of corporations and capitalists so as to preserve the system.
The system is driven by people acting freely. You can’t punish people because of the actions of a few bad eggs.
Then it’s clear that an institution should oversee the behaviour of those making these decisions. If the good guys really aren’t doing anything wrong than they should have nothing to fear.
The system is pure and whole in of itself. To invite government oversight would be to have an outside force, not part of the system, determining its faith, especially with no interest in preserving the system.
Agreed. So everyone within the system should have a say in its direction, especially those who are doing the grunt work. Workers, unions, and lower management should have a greater say, if not equal footing, with those higher up on the corporate ladder, since arguably they rely on the system more than those who have already cashed out.
But-
Do you see how no matter what the discussion is, the narrative switches back and forth between The Free Market and Great Man Theory? Between the system is whole in of itself and the system relies on visionaries of industry. All the while none of the actual problems (involuntary participation, the myth of meritocracy, golden parachutes, profit motive, the hierarchy of production) are ever addressed.
The point of this Quantum Capitalism, this Schrodinger’s Economics, isn’t to address and solve the problems. It’s to deflect any call for the crux of the argument to collapse into one or the other; the system is the problem, the people are the problem.
The irony is that if it actually was allowed to fall into either of these camps, progress would be made. A capitalist system that ensure a base line for living standards, free time, and income would prop itself up for centuries. Capitalists who actually have justify their actions and decisions would create a better understanding of why things happen and how to solve problems.
I began by drawing a parallel to light, and how you view it as matter or energy, but never both at the same time. It’s the observation of it that determines what you see. Capitalists have quietly realised that so long as they keep their eyes close, and pretend they see the opposite of whatever you see, they never have to admit that it becomes something they don’t want it to be, allowing them to justify anything and everything.
Like how both energy and matter can’t be destroyed, only changed from one state to another, Capitalists need to accept, whether it’s the system or the people, something needs to change.
