Failure to Extend Unemployment Benefits Reveals Impasse of the US State
Since the summer of 2007, the United States federal government has extended benefits under the Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) program to unprecedented levels amidst the most serious unemployment crisis the nation has experienced since the great depression of the 1930s. As a result of the collapse of the housing bubble in 2007 and subsequent Wall Street meltdown the following year, official unemployment in the United States has stubbornly hovered around 10 percent.[1]
Under current provisions of the emergency extension, unemployed workers in states with the highest unemployment levels are eligible for up to 99 weeks of benefits, including their regular state benefits, EUC and separate Extended Benefits program. During both the late Bush administration and the new Obama presidency, ensuring federal funding for extended unemployment benefits was considered the cornerstone of economic recovery and stimulus in a broad Keynesian policy of attempting to prop up consumer demand through government spending. As any good Keynesian would tell you, unemployment benefits are among the best stimulus tools available, as unemployed workers generally spend their benefits right away in the local economy rather than stashing them away as savings. From the middle of 2007 to about midway through 2009, the American bourgeoisie was more or less united, across partisan lines, on extending unemployment benefits as an appropriate measure to respond to an economy all regarded as in deep recession. The goal of this policy was to prop up consumer demand and convince an increasingly frightened and cynical public that the state cares about workers who were unfortunate enough to lose their jobs due to the malfeasance of the banks and “irresponsible homeowners.”
Fast forward to the summer of 2010: Official unemployment has barely dropped at 9.5 percent[2], the average length of unemployment is now a stunning 34 weeks (more than the 26 weeks of unemployment benefits available under regular state programs) and hundreds of thousands of workers have already exhausted all the benefits for which they are eligible under the federal extensions, leading to the coining of a new term on the unemployment internet message boards—the “99 weeker.”[3] However, now—unlike the previous two years—the political consensus for further unemployment extensions in Washington has evaporated. For the last six months, Democrats and Republicans have been going at one another over the twin threats of the national debt and a possible double dip recession, using the plight of the unemployed and the further extension of unemployment benefits as ideological clubs.
According to the Republican line, the unprecedented extension of unemployment benefits has only served to subsidize unemployment by giving the long term unemployed an incentive to veg out and skip looking for work, at the same time that it has contributed to a swelling national debt that threatens the long term health of the national economy. Meanwhile, Democrats berate the cruelty of their Republican foes who want to turn their back on the nation’s unemployed by cutting off their benefit checks, simultaneously threatening economic recovery by stifling consumer spending, ultimately risking a new round of home foreclosures—leading to a double dip recession.
This debate has played itself out in high drama several times over the past sixth months in the U.S. Senate, with that body only agreeing to a series of last minute compromise emergency benefit extensions just as previous extensions were set to expire threatening to cut off the flow of unemployment benefit checks. However, this pattern has now come to a screeching halt with Republicans putting up a supposedly principled fight to filibuster any further benefit extensions citing their concerns about the spiraling national deficit. Since June 2nd, workers have been unable to advance to any new tiers of unemployed benefits as Republican Senators have stubbornly refused to approve any new extensions that aren’t “paid for.” As this article goes to press, the Senate has just rejected a series of bills that would have extended unemployment benefits until November and has now gone home for the July 4th recess without approving any extensions.[4] As a result of the Senate’s inaction, the National Employment Law Project (NELP) now estimates that 3.2 million unemployed workers will see their benefits cut off over the next month. [5]
So what is behind this abrupt change in policy for the American bourgeoisie? How should unemployed workers—and indeed the entire working class given that in the midst of this crisis even those of us with a job could be without it at a moment’s notice—interpret the debate over the unemployment benefits extension that has seemingly pitted Democrats against Republicans over the last several months? Are Democrats really looking out for us against the cruel heartless Republicans? Is the rhetoric about the national debt just political posturing and an ideological ploy to convince workers to accept “inevitable austerity”?
Debt crisis fuels austerity plans
The Republican Party’s actions—and certainly its rhetoric—in blocking the further extension of unemployment benefits do reveal that in fact the Grand Old Party now regroups some of the most ideologically driven right-wing factions of the bourgeoisie. Under the influence of the Tea Party, the Republican party has become home to all types of right-wing ideologues who really seem to believe their own rhetoric about the unemployed being lazy free loaders, and who would—if they had their way—abolish whatever remains of American state capitalism’s social “safety net” immediately, regardless of the effects on the wider economy and society. For these Republicans—and their Tea Party allies—unemployment insurance is nothing more than an unfair subsidy to the lazy and inept paid for out of the tax proceeds extracted from hard working Americans, most notably the small businessmen that supposedly form the backbone of American society in their idyllic vision of the shopkeeper’s utopia.[6]
The fact that American politics is capable of producing a bourgeois faction with considerable sway within one of the two major political parties, operating with such an ideological view of the world, is clear evidence of the accelerating decomposition of the American state, in which important factions of the bourgeoisie have simply lost the capacity to strategize in the interests of the national capital itself, but instead take their orders from naked ideologues and demagogues concerned only with short-term partisan interest. In the short to medium term, the Republican Party’s action in blocking the further extension of unemployment benefits compromises the position of the national state to address the immediate needs of the total national capital to prop up demand, shore up local economies and ward off the danger of a double dip recession.[7] Moreover, in acting to cut off the benefits of so many unemployed workers in one fell swoop at the national level, the Republicans’ actions threaten to alienate an entire swathe of workers who have now been introduced to the brutality of the American state in the most direct way possible: the immediate cutting off of the measly unemployment benefit checks that have so far just barely kept them and their families from foreclosure, eviction, bankruptcy and even homelessness. [8]
Nevertheless, despite the apparent short-term inanity of the Republican position on unemployment benefit extensions—and while we can debate whether their concern over the growing national deficit is genuine or merely staged for short term partisan goals—the underlying debt problem is in fact very real for the American bourgeoisie. A growing consensus is in fact emerging among the entire bourgeoisie that the national debt cannot be allowed to continue to grow out of control and that national austerity is in the offing. It is in this context that even some Democrats have started to come around to the Republican position on unemployment extensions: they are just too costly.[9] Let us workers not forget that it was actually a Democrat—Senator Ben Nelson from Nebraska—who cast the deciding ‘No’ vote on the latest extension bill, ensuring that over 3 million of our unemployed brethren will lose benefits in the weeks ahead, baring a dramatic change of course following the July 4th recess.[10] Moreover, on the eve of the latest vote on the extension, the Majority leader in the House of Representatives, Steny Hoyer of Maryland, gave a foreboding address to the Third Way—a supposedly centrist Washington think-tank—laying out the growing consensus of concern about the spiraling national debt, which he said would make further extensions of unemployment benefits difficult, if not impossible.
At the end of the day, workers must recognize the simple fact that, regardless of ideological and partisan commitments, the bourgeoisie is in the last instance always driven by the cold hard logic of the state and capital. With the failure of the ‘expansionist’ policies to jolt-start a sustained recovery, and with the debt-crisis in Europe threatening to destabilize the whole capitalist system, this logic at the present juncture more and more dictates austerity over Keynesianism[11]. Simply put, whether it is run by Democrats or Republicans, the state cannot continue to extend unemployment benefits forever. Whether they cut us off after Tier 4, Tier 5 or Tier 8,[12] the state will eventually have to respond to the dictates of capital and phase out further benefit extensions for long-term unemployed workers. Whether gradually, or in one fell swoop—if the most retrograde factions of the Republican Party have their way—millions of our working class brothers and sisters will face the reality of being permanently sidelined from the official labor market and forced to make a living through other means.
Workers Must Reject Calls to Defend the State
Whatever the motivations of the Republican Party, its rhetoric over the last several months—egged on by conservative talk radio, Fox News and Tea Party activists—has clearly been designed to drive a wedge between workers who still have jobs and the unemployed. They want to paint the unemployed as lazy freeloaders who do not really want to work and who just want to live on the government dole—in other words, off of the labor of other workers extracted as taxes. As frightening, and as completely wrong, as this ideology is, workers must not fall for the opposite side of the coin as Democrats execute the classic ideological division of labor by painting the state as the generous provider of benefits that helps the unfortunate through tough economic times. This side of the ideological coin is clearly designed to trap workers behind a defense of the state as the protector of the values of social solidarity, epitomized by unemployment insurance.
Workers must be clear about this unemployment insurance system that the bourgeois left want us to defend. Unemployment insurance in the United States was never meant to be permanent. In “non-emergency” conditions regular state benefits only last for 26 weeks. Moreover, only a fraction of unemployed workers actually meet the very strict eligibility requirements to qualify for unemployment benefits, which generally hinges on complex monetary formulae designed to establish a workers’ “long-term connection” to the labor market. Most unemployed workers receive no benefits whatsoever. In addition, even unemployed workers who may be technically eligible for benefits are often denied on dubious grounds and lose subsequent appeal hearings, which they do not understand and in which the rules of a court of law apply. And for those who do qualify for benefits? They generally receive only fraction of their pay while they were working—amounts that often do not even allow recipients to keep their heads above water anyway. Is this the epitome of social solidarity? Hardly! Is this system an overly generous subsidy that gives workers an incentive to milk the dole? Not even close! In the minutiae of its eligibility and procedural rules and the paltry benefits it provides, the capitalist state’s unemployment insurance system is revealed for what it really is: an arbitrary, bureaucratic monstrosity designed to pacify the working class at the least cost possible for the state and employers.
Workers must not fall for either side of the bourgeois ideological coin when it comes to the debate regarding the extension of unemployment benefits. Those of us who are lucky enough to remain employed in the midst of this unprecedented crisis must not be baited into attacking our class brothers and sisters who have been forced to utilize the unemployment insurance system to eek out a subsistence living. On the other side, unemployed workers must not fall for the trap of looking to the state for our salvation. We waste our time when we stay up late at night watching C-SPAN[13], following the progress of each unemployment insurance extension bill as it winds its way through the tortured halls of Congress. We dilute our real class anger when we allow ourselves to be mobilized behind email and telephone campaigns to Congressional offices, imploring members of Congress to extend benefits just one more time. All this will do is increase our anxiety and demoralize us even more when the eventual final cut-off comes. We must recognize that our struggle, if it is to be successful, must confront the state, rather than beg for the pittances bourgeois legalism might or might not grant. How much longer will we accept seeing our lives, our very well-being reduced to a pawn in a cruel, calculated, heartless political game between bourgeois factions, all with the same ultimate prerogative to enact austerity?
Only the path of class struggle on our own class terrain, through our autonomous class organs can unite the employed and unemployed and challenge the very society which produces the want, poverty, anxiety and desperation which currently grips our class. While the bourgeoisie will seek to divide the working class amongst itself, the increasingly harsh and full-frontal attacks on living and working conditions by the state will provide the fertile ground for struggles to develop where workers will be able to express their solidarity with the unemployed and rediscover their historic class identity. Only the road of struggle can provide the antidote to despair.
--Henk
07/02/2010
[1] The ICC has in numerous previous articles explained that the bourgeoisie’s official unemployment numbers grossly underestimates the real extent and social impact of joblessness.
[2] According the official job numbers released on Friday July 2nd, the unemployment rate has fallen to 9.5 percent from a previous 9.7 percent. However, even bourgeois economists were forced to admit that this drop was due largely to discouraged long-term unemployed workers simply giving up looking for a job. See “Economy lags as job growth remains weak ” in the Washington Post, Saturday, July 3rd, 2010.
[3] See www.unemployed-friends.forumotion.com, an internet message board for unemployed workers, where the discussions have been dominated for months by the anxious hoping for additional tiers of benefits.
[4] To be accurate, the proposed extension of benefits would not have made any workers who had already exhausted their 99 weeks (or all the tiers they were eligible for) eligible for any additional benefits. It would only have allowed workers to continue to advance to the next tier of emergency benefits until November.
[5] To put it another way, the number of unemployed workers in the United States who could potentially lose their benefits over the next month is about equivalent to the population of Uruguay.
[6] This is of course beside the fact that the Republican Party is largely bankrolled by corporate America and the Tea Party is in many ways the brainchild of millionaire anti-tax activists.
[7] Another ominous motive for the Republican’s stand against unemployment benefit extensions was given by the Nobel prize winning left-of-center economist Paul Krugman on the “Charlie Rose Show” of 7/02/2010. He referred to the ‘Theory of pain’ which goes that forcing pain on people now, even though it is not immediately necessary in the short term, not only reassures the bond markets that governments are serious about addressing the deficits, but also conditions the populace for more substantial pain in the future when the growing deficit makes even deeper universal cuts inescapable. See http://www.charlierose.com
[8] If Congress does not enact an extension package when it returns from the July 4th recess, it will mark the first time in history federal EUC programs have been allowed to expire with the official unemployment rate still above 8 percent.
[9] It was with some considerable awkwardness that President Obama attempted to mount a meek defense of continued Keynesian stimulus at the G20 in Toronto in the midst of a growing international consensus for austerity made necessary by the so-called sovereign debt crisis in Europe, Japan and elsewhere. At the very least, Obama must not have come off as very convincing to his fellow world leaders as he called for continued stimulus abroad, just as his own Congress coldly rejected further unemployment insurance extensions at home citing the spiraling national debt.
[10] Granted a number of bourgeois commentators expect that an additional extension will eventually pass once the Senate reconvenes after the July 4th recess and a replacement for the late Democratic Senator—and one time Ku Klux Klan member—Robert Byrd from West Virginia can be seated and provide the deciding vote. However, even if another extension does in fact pass this does not change the fundamental dilemma facing American state capitalism, which will eventually necessitate a final termination of benefit extensions.
[11] See ‘Debt-Crisis: The State Is Bankrupt, Workers Must not Bail it Out ’, Internationalism, no. 155.
[12] Discussions on www.unemployed-friends.forumotion.com have been dominated by pleas for a Tier 5 of benefits for months (the current EUC program ends after Tier 4). While such a demand may eventually broaden into a confrontation with the state itself, the tone of the discussions so far have unfortunately remained mired in bourgeois legalism.
[13] C-SPAN is the U.S. cable news network that provides live feeds of the proceedings on the floor of Congress.
Comments
The situation's horrible
On the one hand, cutting off benefits hurts people like myself who are unemployed through no fault of their own. On the other hand, if the taxes and spending of the government were severely cut, the economy will grow again. For the very reason that current capitalism is "decadent" is because the increasing role of the state since the "Progressive Era" has led to the sucking dry of needed investment capital. Return to laissez-faire and the money freed would spark an amazing boom. The only problem is those who would suffer in the meantime through no fault of their own!
The Progressive Era was an
The Progressive Era was an American phenomenon. I get what you're trying to say, but the decadence of capitalism is a world phenomenon and deserves a global explanation for its onset. Yours doesn't cut it. Second, and more importantly, the "sucking dry of investment capital" by the state, or the crowding out of the market by state intervention, doesn't really explain the decadence of capitalism either. A return to laissez-faire is one of the things the rational parts of the world bourgeoisie most fear. That kind of attitude led to the double-dip recession in the late 1930s, and they fear just such a double-dip recession now if the world governments stop stimulating the economy.
Hidden Author, I am sorry to
Hidden Author, I am sorry to hear about your employment situation. What do you think unemployed workers should do faced with the crisis?
The Progressive Era was worldwide
The only difference is that in America it is called the Progressive Era whereas in the rest of the world it is called the rise of the social democratic parties. The important thing is that the decadence of capitalism just coincidentally happened to occur when governments starting to make concessions to the Left! And the double-dip recession of the 1930s happened because the recession of the early 1930s created an interventionist overreaction by the governments of the time. There's even a quote by a high American official of the time about how stimulus failed to revive the economy.
'Progressive Era'
The ICC's policy regarding decadence is clear. State capitalism (which includes heavy state intervention in the economy; often in 'Keynesian' ways- such as Social Security/state pensions, large public works projects, support for industrial and trade unions and their integration with the State through bodies like the NLRB and TUC, unemployment and disability benefits, government health care, etc). You call these 'concessions to the left'- yes, the Left side of Capital.
You are right that around the time of the beginning of what the ICC calls 'the beginning of capitalist decadence', the tendency toward State Capitalism was worldwide- because capitalism is a global system, and the change in epoch required new policies, state capitalism (in different degrees) is one of them.
The policies of Keynes are credited by most competant capitalist economists for 'saving capitalism'- this continues today with the so-called 'Bailout' and austerity programs worldwide to ameliorate the economic crisis.
Further points
"The important thing is that the decadence of capitalism just coincidentally happened to occur when governments starting to make concessions to the Left!"
On the face of it, it's absurd to claim that a world-wide economic phenomenon had absolutely nothing to do with a world-wide political phenomenon when the two happened simultaneously. However, per your first comment on this article, it would seem that you see decadence and state intervention not as coincidental phenomena but as one and the same thing; or at least economies became "decadent" because of the intervention of the state. If that's the case, the only coincidence you need to worry about is the fact that all states adopted similar policies at the same time -- and I figure it's up to you to explain why that is.
"Concessions to the left"
I agree with Mike on this one. I haven't read the book, but in 'The Triumph of Conservatism,' the leftist historian Gabriel Kolko argues that the regulations in the progressive era weren't aimed at limiting the rights of capital in anyway, but rather were intended to limit competition between capitals. About 20 years later, the New Deal was an obvious attempt to save capitalism for crisis. The fact that these policies were "concessions to the left" simply show the counter-revolutionary nature of the left as defenders of a more state-ified capitalism.For instance, it's hardly a controversial thesis (at least among folks who aren't blind defenders of trade unionism) that the unionization of America was an attempt to limit the severity of strikes; it's no accident that Roosevelt's labor legislation came during one of the greatest strike waves in history (1933-1934) -- or is it? I suppose you might chalk it up to coincidence.
"if the taxes and spending of the government were severely cut, the economy will grow again."
I'm glad it's that simple!
Micah: "The important thing
Micah: "The important thing is that the decadence of capitalism just coincidentally happened to occur when governments starting to make concessions to the Left!"
On the face of it, it's absurd to claim that a world-wide economic phenomenon had absolutely nothing to do with a world-wide political phenomenon when the two happened simultaneously. However, per your first comment on this article, it would seem that you see decadence and state intervention not as coincidental phenomena but as one and the same thing; or at least economies became "decadent" because of the intervention of the state. If that's the case, the only coincidence you need to worry about is the fact that all states adopted similar policies at the same time -- and I figure it's up to you to explain why that is.
HA: Just because nations have separate governments, it doesn't mean that they lack a common culture. Western Civilization is real even though it is an abstract concept. And in Western Civilization, socialism was the big movement of the late nineteenth to early twentieth centuries just as classical liberalism was the big movement of the late eighteenth to early nineteenth centuries!
Micah: "Concessions to the left"
I agree with Mike on this one. I haven't read the book, but in 'The Triumph of Conservatism,' the leftist historian Gabriel Kolko argues that the regulations in the progressive era weren't aimed at limiting the rights of capital in anyway, but rather were intended to limit competition between capitals.
HA: Of course, the Left has the backing of major capitalists. In fact, there is a section of the bourgeoisie in which the life cycle is as follows. As youthful college students, they endorse everything from feminism to the Weather Underground by dedicating their lives to political activism (like a fervently-held religion). Then when they become old enough to bear responsibilities they become politicians like Hillary Clinton and moneybags for the Left through foundations such as the Rockfeller, Ford and Gates Foundations. Such capitalists provide the propaganda arm of the Left--without such well-funded propaganda, voters could decide that state benefits are not worth state taxes. And of course, such leftwing capitalists use their connections to the State to make profits like any good businessman would!
Micah: About 20 years later, the New Deal was an obvious attempt to save capitalism for crisis. The fact that these policies were "concessions to the left" simply show the counter-revolutionary nature of the left as defenders of a more state-ified capitalism.For instance, it's hardly a controversial thesis (at least among folks who aren't blind defenders of trade unionism) that the unionization of America was an attempt to limit the severity of strikes; it's no accident that Roosevelt's labor legislation came during one of the greatest strike waves in history (1933-1934) -- or is it? I suppose you might chalk it up to coincidence.
"if the taxes and spending of the government were severely cut, the economy will grow again."
I'm glad it's that simple!
Hidden Author: If the capitalists can't manage their assets, then I suppose the government should step in. But rather than throw good money after bad, why not give the workers assets in the various companies. Of course, you guys denounce self-management as self-exploitation!
But in spite of capitalist decadence, the economy revived after World War II. You wanna know why? Because the war imposed a consensus on reviving industry rather than fighting class warfare. This revived economy benefited the workers as well. But a far less bloody means of revival would be to give the workers assets because then the workers would protect their investment by investing their labor power, the vital ingredient to the production of goods and services needed by society!
In fact you guys say that a workers' society cannot evolve out of capitalism the way capitalism evolved out of feudalism because the workers own nothing. But what if the workers did own something and that something was continuously increasing? The market may still exist but as assets increased, the workers could organize federations to counter the worst effects of the market. The resulting society would not be communism but the assimilation of capitalism into a workers' cooperativism just as capitalism assimilated feudalism with its class of landowning nobility. Food for thought!
Post-WWII '30 glorious years'
There are several explanations for the post-WWII economic prosperity. It had little to do with an 'fighting the class war'- you make it sound like capitalists are in control of the market, and can make it grow or shrink based on their policies- when in reality the ruling class is extremely divided on how to keep the house of cards from falling apart, resulting in a regression back into heavy localism, small and large scale wars, unrestrained environmental damage, outright poverty among most segments of the Western working class (equal to the poverty of the working class in the poorest countries today), etc. Hence the term 'Socialism or Barbarism".
State Capitalism (state intervention in the economy; such as nationalizing businesses or industries, providing a 'social safety net', etc). It has nothing to do with what the individual capitalists themselves believed as a kid and believe as an adult- their actions are based on the requirements of global and national capital. The previous Republican administration in the US is a good example. Most of them grew up despising not only communism, socialism, unions, stalinism, etc but also leftism and centre-leftism. They play lip service to libertarian, localist and 'fiscal conservatism' but when in power it is essential for them to enact State Capitalist policies to keep things together. There is nothing left or right about state capitalism- both further it because it is necessary for the continued existance of capitalism in its period of decadence. Within a decade, regimes of all 'left or right' of capital political persuasions enacted state capitalist measures- from Fascist Italy and Germany, Stalinist Russia and Democratic America.
Re: Post-WWII Boom
I meant to say the ruling class is divided politically, but when it comes to action they both are forced to enact or alter state capitalist policies- no matter what their propaganda says.
Well, it's certainly hard to
Well, it's certainly hard to cut benefits when they are so spread out. I mean, how would the voters react if the Republicans took away the Social Security and Medicare of the elderly and the Medicaid of the poor? I think the Republican Party would be finished once hundreds of thousands of the elderly and poor either died outright or went through a living hell! And democracy is too entrenched in America for there to be a dictatorship, the only form of government that could force cuts on the people against the will of the people!
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This is why even conservatives support the welfare state. But capitalism can thrive for centuries if not milennia if it made the following difficult--nay, almost insurmountable challenges:
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1. Provide for the elderly and the poor while cutting the revenue collected by the State.
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2. Neuter the Left permanently. This is even harder than Number 1. Because even if a dictatorship was established, the Left would return as soon as the people forced the return of democracy--as can be seen with the histories of Chile and Spain!
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3. Create a monetary system in which the supply of money rises and falls almost precisely in tandem with the rise and fall of the economy's value. This would be almost as hard as neutering the Left permanently because one false move and the administrators of this policy would be permanently discredited ending their ability to fix things for the better! (Even partial discrediting would be disastrous as trust of the administrators would have to be a consensus within society.)
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Now about the ability of the ruling class to control the economy. As you pointed out, the ability of the ruling class to control the economy exists in almost inverse proportion to how fragmented they are. And if tighter state control is the goal then unity must emerge in favor of the Left. And this unity will occur when the Right is unable to meet the three challenges previously mentioned. But if there is a rightwing faction capable of meeting these three challenges or at least making significant progress to meeting these challenges, then a growing private economy will emerge. So far no rightwing faction has a smart enough leadership to achieve this!
Also post-WWII prosperity
Also post-WWII prosperity had nothing to do with fighting a class war--it had everything to do with (temporarily) ending it with a truce! This truce was ended by the turn to the Left in the 60s as things shifted from people propping up the State to the State propping up people. (Since the State is primarily a mechanism of redistribution as far as economics goes, then what happens when less people are giving and more people are receiving? Think of the folly of the farmer whose goose laid golden eggs!) In turn, the capitalists responded to a militant working class by outsourcing. Which worked when you consider how unemployment broke the unions! And thus with the class war going on, you have capitalists depriving First World workers of jobs and pay while workers use the State to take back capitalists' profits. (Never mind that it is profits that allow for the continued production of goods and services and doubly so, if the production is to expand!)
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And so we have a mess throughout the world!
HA: FYI, Mrs. Clinton was a
HA: FYI, Mrs. Clinton was a member of the College Republicans (and was even elected president of her chapter), so she makes for a poor example in your ridiculous "life cycle" fantasy. And she wasn't a garden-variety Republican, but a Goldwater-supporting extremist, who changed parties only due to her opposition to the US invasion, occupation, and slaughter of Vietnam (opposition which was the only thing positive about Barry). It was no mistake when Bill was cynically called a Republican by the more progressive Democrats; he and she are both devoted economic right-wingers, and they always have been.
P.S. Profit is derived from surplus value, which capitalists extract from workers by owning the means of production and leaving the latter no choice but to accept a raw deal. So to speak of profit in a positive light is to speak of extortion in glowing terms.
You say that it is unfair
You say that it is unfair for a capitalist to make profit when the product is created through the worker's labor. But have you ever asked why some people are capitalists and other people are workers in the first place? Could it be because the capitalist worked harder or was smarter? That is very likely if he or she was not born with a fortune.
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But even if he or she inherited from a parent, then surely the parent, if he or she worked hard to obtain the capital, should be able to give to whoever he or she pleases. And since the child in this case, obtained the property legitimately (without force or fraud) then the child should be able to give the capital to his or her child who should be able to give the property to his or her child and so on and so forth. The main limitation should be based on how dependent that fortune is on being propped up by the State, after all the State is built by the tax dollars of everyone, not just one capitalist!
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And even if Hillary Clinton started out as a conservative, there are many leftists with wealthy backgrounds! Even in Marxist parties, many of the cadres and certainly most of the leadership are not proletarians but middle to upper class individuals. How proletarian was the background of Marx and Lenin?
Social Darwinism
To start with, Marxist opposition to capitalism is not based on its morality. Most previous modes of production were equally violent and oppressive- slavery then serfdom. Capitalism is no longer a progressive mode of production- meaning, after it completed the world market, it created the means for humanity to satisfy all of its material needs. The resources, communication, labor, technology is all there on a global level to support all life on this earth on a 'each works to their ability, each receives according to their needs' system. No more wage labor, no more surplus value, no more money. Capitalism has provided us these tools- however, once it finished this world market, it stopped being progressive; it stopped giving humanity any additional benefits. It had served its purpose, it had expanded to its limit, but like every mode of production before it, it has to be overthrown by another class and replaced with a new, more progressive mode of production (socialism, communism). That capitalism is exploitative and produces systemic abuse of mankind is what gives the proletariat and other non-exploiting classes the desire and need to struggle against it.
You are resorting to a social-darwinist argument, that there are some people who are so superior to everyone else that they ought to not only be treated better in general, but should enjoy all of the luxuries, comfort and material & psychological bliss that the world has to offer- because they are a certain way. This argument is at the heart of every kind of discrimination, from segregation to racial hygiene to eugenics. People are all different, some excel at different things, others have wants and needs that are different from the norm; but I don't believe that any person, no matter what they are or who they are, should be put on a pedastle and worshipped at the expense of everyone else. Every social experiment, policy or movement that comes from these conceptions has hurt people. No good can come of it. I defy anyone to produce any evidence that wealthy people as a whole are different from everyone else. They're not.
You believe that capitalists
You believe that capitalists should give their businesses to society...well then, summon up the hard work, the time and the creative ingenuity needed to start a business up from scratch...then give away the business to your workers and at long last you will have the credibility to say what you say about the fate of other people's property!
HA: You take it for granted
HA: You take it for granted that the capitalist owns the business legitimately, even though I've already explained that they (or whoever handed it down to them, which, incidentally, is no different from the aristocratic injustices that were ostensibly thrown off by the founders of the US due to their outrage at such behavior) obtained it through extortion.
You also sneak in the laughable premise that the capitalist obtained the business through "hard work, time and creative ingenuity" when in fact it reduces in its entirety to the hard work, time and creative ingenuity of... (say it with me) workers. The capitalist merely supplies the funds to get the ball rolling -- funds which, again, he obtained, directly or indirectly, by theft.
Finally, you take private property over social necessities for granted, as though it existed from time immemorial, when in fact it was imposed by violence and fraud, and must be continually enforced by the same, or by the threat of it (police, military... in a word, the bourgeois state -- the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie).
Benevolent capitalists?
Again, you spout this social-darwinist, aristocratic ubermenschen crap. From a devils advocate perspective, I cannot find a single argument for letting a very tiny group of the global human population to control access to housing, food, water, medicine and education. If it were possible for these tiny groups to use their 'private property' to fulfill the needs of all, there wouldn't be a problem. But capitalist social relations and production rleations make it an impossibility for this to happen. In its early history, capitalism was superior to previous modes of production. It did increase the overall standard of living of people in general in some areas of the earth- however, even in those areas where capitalism has had the greatest positive impact, it is not only no longer progressing and making anything better anymore, it cannot even sustain the positive development it has already accomplished decades or centuries ago. This is the heart of the decadence theory- that capitalism does not have a positive role to play any longer as of a hundred years ago- and the longer it survives past this expiration date, the worse life becomes for people in general- even in those areas of the globe that are blessed with the highest standards of living (Western Europe, North America) the standard of living is falling apart. This is all due to the inherent contradictions of capitalism- specifically the tendancy of the rate of profit to fall and overproduction.
Hidden Author, is there
Hidden Author, is there anything you agree with in the article?
"But even if he or she
"But even if he or she inherited from a parent, then surely the parent, if he or she worked hard to obtain the capital, should be able to give to whoever he or she pleases."
You're assuming that "hard work" was involved somewhere along the line. However, capitalism's historical record shows something rather different. Let's take a look at capitalist development in England. Capitalism there was made possible by two factors: the transformation of tenants into workers, and by an influx of liquid money. The landlords were landlords, ultimately, because their ancestors had been part of William the Conqueror's army. The money came first as booty from France in the Hundred Years' War, then from state-sponsored piracy, and finally from the slave trade. The only "hard work" done here was the hard work of conquering other people's land and taking their stuff.
America's case is even simpler: the rich men of the English and Spanish colonies were rich men before they crossed the sea, and remained rich thereafter. Those who 'rose through the ranks' could do so only because plague and war had wiped out the native people and left the land and its resources empty and grabable.
Micah
"You believe that capitalists should give their businesses to society...well then, summon up the hard work, the time and the creative ingenuity needed to start a business up from scratch...then give away the business to your workers and at long last you will have the credibility to say what you say about the fate of other people's property!"
Then a person might as well say that before one defends capitalism credibly, they have to starve to death in Africa or lose an arm in a factory accident in Detroit. This line of reasoning serves merely to evade the question of whether capitalism has outlived its usefulness.
So it's NEVER EVER EVEN ONCE
So it's NEVER EVER EVEN ONCE happens that a proletarian can acquire the fortune needed to become a bourgeoisie?
To expand upon my point: The
To expand upon my point: The case of the worker becoming the boss has NEVER happened (even today)? And if so, could it be that the worker become the boss because he or she worked harder than his or her colleagues? You don't it's possible that a worker by working longer hours than his fellows could acquire capital? But here in rural California, I know of millionaires who started out as farmhands! In one case, the man because of physical ailment could only sleep one or two hours a day. He used the time awake to work his way to a business of his own--and lost some fingers in the process. Tell me, do most workers (in America) put in THAT MUCH effort? And if not, then why should they have the same reward?
You're missing the point. It
You're missing the point. It doesn't matter how hard you work, one person's labour can NEVER produce the disparity in living standards between millionaires and workers. At a certain point, they are no longer reaping the rewards of their own additional labour but are exploiting the labour of others, whether directly or indirectly.
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The fact that individual workers can achieve bourgeois status in no way changes the underlying relations of exploitation. It simply means an individual has made a transition from being exploited to exploiter.
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Lastly, you still haven't yet answered the question the other contributors have asked: has this social system outlived its usefulness or not?
"So it's NEVER EVER EVEN
"So it's NEVER EVER EVEN ONCE happens that a proletarian can acquire the fortune needed to become a bourgeoisie?"
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Sure it can happen, and it has, and it does. But I don't suppose you've ever heard the phrase "The exception proves the rule," have you?
The fact that it is so exceedingly rare only proves the point. Besides, it makes no difference how a person becomes a member of the exploiting class; we only take issue with the rule because it is, in fact, the rule: the overwhelming majority of the exploiting class did not get there by their own efforts. In most cases it was handed to them on a silver platter. Perhaps you've heard the phrase, "It takes money to make money"?
Finishing my point: We take
Finishing my point: We take issue with exploitation. It is no virtue to manage to claw your way to the top of the societal pyramid, proclaim yourself "King of the Mountain," and begin extracting surplus value from your former fellows at the bottom. If the majority got there that way, then that's what we'd spend most time attacking. But because it's about as likely as winning the lottery, we instead attack the exploiting class as we find it, which, again, is in a form not unlike a feudal aristocracy.
Aspiring businessmen "claw"
Aspiring businessmen "claw" themselves to the top? Could it be that they just work harder or are smarter (if they succeed)?
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And if Bob is born from poor parents and through his hard work becomes a businessman, then is he going to exploit his workers? Or does he give them access to capital (the wages which they get being the fruit of this access) that they were unable to obtain on their own?
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Now your next point about the decadence of the system. Obviously a system in which businesses are propped up by the State makes a mockery of the proposition that one earns his or her property. But if the State has so many assets, could the solution be that the workers be organized into collectives with each collective receiving a factory, a store or similar asset in return for many years of low-pay work? Such a scheme would revive the economy the same way that World War II did--by convincing people to delay gratification as opposed to "stimulus" programs that rob Peter to pay Paul. (How does redistributing money add to the total supply of money?) That way the workers sacrifice not just for some boss but to build their futures as well!
I must confess, I didn't
I must confess, I didn't read all these comments but after reading the first couple I wanted to say this.
It seems empty to blame the "concessions to the left" as the root cause for the failings of capitalism. I see capitalism as a whole economic, social and political entity. Given the nature of the beast - that it expands through exploitation of the working class - it produced its opponents: the working class, who organized to improve its position leading to the formation of unions, labour parties, demands for welfare etc. In response to this challenge the state intervenes to ameliorate the worst effects of capitalism in order to better secure the system. This in turn led to temporary ways to stimulate the economy. But to believe that a "return to laissez faire" is the answer to capitalism's problems is to entirely miss the point and 200 years of history. Such "solutions" are text-book solutions from economics classes that are highly ideological. Rip them up and read history and then you will find that the Marxists are right. Capitalism has reached an historical impasse. The only thing absent at the moment is the movement to finish it off. Without that the world will sink into the mire.
Well put Damien.
Well put Damien.
Marxists are the ideologues
Marxists are the ideologues not economists. I mean, when Lenin finally decided that results were important than ideology, what did he do? He allowed for a revival of capitalism through the NEP whereas when he operated by ideology like a typical Marxist, his goal was to smash capitalism. And it is interesting that when the CPSU moved away from the NEP, they did so, not by convincing people to be altruists contributing to the common good, but rather by enslaving people! If and when the ICC gains power and people refuse to altruistically contribute to the common good, will the ICC also enslave people?
Hidden Author, Really, do
Hidden Author,
Really, do you read? The ICC states very clearly in its platform and basic positions that it is not the goal of the revolutionary organization to take power. Why you feel you have the right to engage in denigrating the ICC, w/o even having read or comprehended its basic positions is beyond me. Do your homework rather than assuming.
Marxism vs Idealism
You try to distill complex historical situations into soundbytes, HA.
The Russian Revolution, in my personal opinion, proved beyond a reasonable doubt that you cannot 'smash' or 'destroy' capitalist social and economic relations overnight- not until at least the majority of the world including most central capitalist countries (with the highest concentrations of the proletariat, i.e. Western Europe) have gone through a successful political revolution of the working class.
Some leftists (Progressive Labor Party, for example) argue that there is no 'transition state' or 'transition period', that it is possible, as soon as a working class revolution takes political power away from the bourgeoisie, to establish socialist economic relations- even if that revolution is only successful in one region or country. This is similar to the argument of some anarchists that Makhno and the Spanish 'commune collectives' represent a better model than the Russian Revolution- it seems to me that this is simply the illusion of worker's self-management on a larger scale than one factory or business- a temporary affair where the working class organizes its own exploitation until the bourgeoisie re-establishes political supremacy (as happened in Spain with the wholesale massacres of workers at the hands of the Stalinists and various leftist groups at the behest of their Republican state).
Capitalist relations will not be immediately abolished simply by a political revolution of the working class in a given area.
Of course, all power will
Of course, all power will belong to the workers! The Party's role is operate "behind the scenes" with such subtle maneuvers as selecting which candidates the workers can elect as delegates!