ANS -- Inequality is a failure of capitalism; Poverty is a failure of capitalism

This is a fairly short essay on how capitalism is failing and  -- well, as they say, "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible make violent revolution inevitable".  It is a warning that our economics has gone too far.

A quote that I often post is this: 

“Capitalism is like fire — it can produce great good or great harm, but to be good it must be carefully, scrupulously, and completely controlled.”  and also: "Poverty exists not because we cannot feed the poor, but because we cannot satisfy the rich."

--Kim

[It wouldn't select the author along with the text, and when I went back to get the author's name to put at the top, the facebook page renewed itself so I can't find it.  I think his name was Steven Jellon.]

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Our nation is getting richer and poorer at the same time. Total wealth is increasing (at least for the time being) but it is concentrating so intensely that many Americans are getting poorer even as wealth increases overall. A few Americans garner an ever-larger share of total wealth, leaving many with an ever-smaller share.

This is not just the few capturing the lion's share of new wealth. The top is actively taking wealth from the bottom. The bottom half of Americans are depleting their savings and going into debt paying the top for the necessities of life. What little wealth they have is flowing away, heading for the top. 40 million Americans have zero net worth, 14 million have negative net worth. Almost half of Americans have no reserve whatsoever. As the old working man's song put it, "Everyday older and deeper in debt."

The bottom half increasingly rely on the government's assistance to live. Some of those who don't (yet) need help see that as taking from the productive to support the unproductive. It is exactly that. Those who deride government assurances as "socialism" want to curtail it as though that were possible..

Inequality is a failure of capitalism. If capitalism cannot provide at least minimally to everyone, then it is not a successful system. Consider what happens to the bottom if government assistance is curtailed? And importantly, think about what folks deprived in the midst of plenty might do to the top? People will not sit and starve just because well-provided folks don't want to share the bounty of their capitalism. Poverty is a failure of capitalism.

Egalitarian capitalism is a necessity, not an option to be foregone at will. Passing laws codifying inequality will be no protection. Providing for those whom capitalism overlooks is paying to protect oneself as from any natural disaster. Pass laws against earthquakes and see what it gets you. Humanity has "earthquakes" too. They will not be stopped by statutes.

Buy the insurance that social government provides. Give the poor what your capitalism does not provide them or face the consequences. Capitalism's failure remains uncorrected and you could get real socialism. That has happened disastrously in large swaths of the world. It is exactly how we got that 300-pound walking, stinking disaster that is Donald Trump.

It is your capitalism; you are responsible for it. It is not for the poor to bear the entire cost of its failures. Make it work at least minimally for all; or share its fruits. Or continue the self-righteous financial moralization and take what happens.

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