Capitalism: The insatiable system

 

I suppose everyone gets to a point in their life when they start to question the progression of their career and life path. Since ‘who one is’ is nearly always defined by ‘what one does’, career path cannot be ignored. But nor is money, the pursuit of it, and the means to earn it alone what define and encapsulate a man’s (or woman's) achievements. If that were so then very few artists, philosophers, humanitarians, and thinkers would ever bother to get out of bed in the morning.

 

Our lives are almost completely consumed by our work, by our pursuit of sustenance; it gets to a point that one begins to wonder why one keeps going at all. Does one work to live or does one live just to work. Increasingly that decision is more and more being taken out of the individual’s hands. Our capitalist system requires slave labor to keep going and in return the system provides its workers with the bare minimum to survive: Health insurance, so you can afford to seek medical care, education for your children, so they too may learn the capitalist way, food, of course, a roof over your head, and pocket money, but not too much.

 

While the system is frugal in lending you money that you can never pay back, it rarely allows you to save or keep too much of the money you earn in your lifetime. After all financial independence means one can afford free time, time to stop and think, time to wonder if the capitalist system is serving man or if man is serving the system. That is the last thing the system wants you to do.

The only ones who achieve financial independence are often those who have mastered the skill of exploiting others for their own benefit, they are rewarded by the system since their existence and maintenance ensures the system’s survival.

 

Growing old is a funny thing. You age with every second that passes but you rarely notice when you live with purpose. It is only when you lie unused, unwanted, and unnecessary that you begin to notice time fleeting and passing by while you are nailed in place unable to move. To be cast on the rubbish heap while still productive and capable of generating value is one of the system’s cruelest punishments.

It’s a cold hard calculation. Most workers cost very little to begin with because their skill and experience is meager, but they work hard and more than pay for themselves. The formula for employment is simple: the employer takes all the risk, borrows money to start a business, he hires workers and pays them a living wage (just barely), and he gets all the profits or bears all the losses. The worker agrees to this formula and remains bound by it. The business owner has the flexibility to change his line of business and his location. Most countries welcome investors who wish to start a business that will provide employment and pay taxes. The worker does not have the same kind of flexibility.

If you are born poor in the capitalist system chances are most of you will die either poor or with just enough income to buy your medicines, feed yourself and maybe pay rent for a one bedroom apartment. Success in the system is rare, but it does happen and it happens within the rules of capitalism. If you refuse to be slave labor then you must be a slave driver. If you can’t bare life working for others for meager wages then you must have the heartlessness to exploit others and thereby feed the insatiable monster that is capitalism.

 

There are of course exceptions to every rule, there are you might point out the independent professional, like doctors and lawyers, their skills make them invaluable to society. True enough. But every market has a limit on how many of those it needs. What good are doctors if 40 percent of a population can’t afford to go to a doctor?

 

Then you might point out the thousands of artists and entertainers, like movie stars and football players, who make hundreds of millions plying their craft. But you forget the millions who failed to please the crowds and ended up serving you your coffee at your local Starbucks.

 

As a worker in the system you start young and everyone wants you, everyone wants to hire you because of your potential. Every CV an employer gets is like a lump of unmolded clay soft and pliant, easy to manipulate and ready to take any shape. Once you hit your forties if you are still an employee chances are your salary and benefits are considerable and a source of solace to you and your family. But for your employer you are a burdensome expense. While he appreciates the skill and experience you bring on board, your employer continually reviews your usefulness with every passing year. If you reach a point when you cost your employer one cent more than he derives from you in productivity, then you are let go without hesitation.

 

For many, that moment when you are called to the bosses office or taken out for a (last) meal to soften the blow, is second only to being told you have a terminal illness in the impact it has on your psyche and you entire perception of self worth. Employment for many is only a stop gap measure; they work only long enough to save enough money to open their own business. But, then they disappear into obscurity as the village grocer, or barber, or falafel stand owner, and countless other jobs that stave off destitution.

 

But, you may ask, what can be done, individuals of limited financial means are powerless to challenge and change a system governed by the moneyed elite. To a large degree that it true. But, we are at a point in human history when we have many tools at our fingertips that our great grandfathers did not have, instant communication for one, tools to rally supporters, education and knowledge, and what all revolutionaries have on their side: the  truth and the light of day.

 

Ordinary people have a well tuned sense of right and wrong, more than most people in power give them credit for. While most ordinary people are reluctant to rock the boat, everyone has a breaking point, and when injustice becomes the norm you will be surprised what ordinary people are capable of doing. One really must thank the inept bankers and the complicit governments letting them off with a slap on the wrist as this will only cause the pot of poverty and austerity to boil more furiously until critical mass is reached and a chain reaction of popular anger erupts and upends the whole system on its head.