Capitalists

[blueeyedboy]

Do all capitalists gain their wealth through exploitation of other people? Also, if wealth is inherited, does the person who actually inherits it automatically become a capitalist, maybe to increase his/her wealth etc.

Is it possible that high levels of wealth can be created without exploitation of any kind, either light exploitation or extreme.

This might be a naive thread, but any help with this query would be helpful.

[Ricardo]

I wouldn't say hitting the lottery or winning on a scratch ticket would make you a capitalist.

[blueeyedboy]

Ricardo, are you saying this is the only way that people can become rich without exploiting people whatsoever? You didn't elaborate on the question the thread presented.

[rouchambeau]

I suggest reading Marx's Capital. Or better yet, Wage Labor and Capital by Karl Marx if you want something MUCH shorter. They both explain capitalism and how capitalists get their wealth.

[Dreadnaht1]

A traditional Marxist view would be that all forms of capitalism are evil and have some sort of flaw.

However, in modern day politics, there are some capitalists who aren't nearly as bad as the ones in power. A good example would be former Green Party presidential candidate, Ralph Nader. Nader is a wealth capitalist backed by many labor and pro-worker orginzations. If Nader were to ever win the presidency (don't hold your breath), we would see capitalism minus the lower class exploitation. Nader also didn't get his wealth through exploitation of any kind. In fact, he got it from being a good attorney.

But, to your questions, does making money make you a capitalist? No. Does inhereting money make you a capitalist? No. Does exploiting other people for your own monetary or personal gain make you a capitalist? Yes.

[LoneRed]

using the word "evil" is very iffy, as the word has roots in mysticism

[Supreme Leader]

I think only rich people who exploited others for wealth would be considered capitalists. The definition of capitalist is someone who makes their money by exploiting other people. The people that inherit their wealth will not be considered capitalists since they usually don't do anything to increase that wealth.

[Son of a Strummer]

"Do all capitalists gain their wealth through exploitation of other people?"

"Capitalism" describes specific social relations. To be a capitalist requires that you earn your wealth from by contracting wage-labour, however indirectly. According to historical materialism capitalism only emerges in mature forms when mass production systems (such as the putting out system) based on commercial profit motives employ industrial technology. The industrial system of mass production required long-term investment and entailed large corrresponding risks. As Karl Polanyi has explained the most pressing difficulties were an assured supply of the elements of industry- land, elaborate machinery, and labour. I feel the following quote is one of the most important insights/articulations in the history of political economy:

"Although the new productive organization was introduced by the merchant- a fact that determined the whole course of the transformation- the use of elaborate machinery and plant involved the development of the factory system and therewith a decisive shift in the relative importance of commerce and industry in favour of the latter...In a commercial society..(the supply of land, labour, and money) could be organized in only one way, by being made available for purchase. Hence they would have to be organized for sale on the market- in other words as commodities. The extension of the market mechanism to the elements of industry- land, labour and money- was the inevitable consequence of the introduction of the factory system in a commercial society." (Polanyi- Primitive, Archaic and Modern Economies,35)."

Interest-bearing wealth in a mature capitalist social system is ultimately and primarily founded on the exploitation of both living and dead labour, and nature.

"Also, if wealth is inherited, does the person who actually inherits it automatically become a capitalist, maybe to increase his/her wealth etc."

I would say no, not automatically, because "capitalism" describes a system of social institutions in which the capitalist, whether industrial or financial, plays an institutional role in reproducing the system. Those who inherit enough wealth to never have to work and live off interest from savings are largely playing a parasitic role. However insofar as their wealth is invested in the credit system they are part of the system of capitalist exploitation. Capitalist wealth is not created out of thin air. It is ultimately based on the contractual exploition of wage labourers, and ignorant and neglectful attitudes towards the earth's metabolism. There are indeed exceptions- certainly including the traces of institutions from past epochs based on feudal and other forms of exploitation.

"Is it possible that high levels of wealth can be created without exploitation of any kind, either light exploitation or extreme."

High levels of wealth? How? If it is by winning a lottery you can hardly say that the person "gained" or "earned" the wealth. Is it just? - or merely fortunate? In a system of private property someone's lottery winning can always be translated to disproportionate social power. High degrees of inequality undermine all norms of reciprocity and social solidarity, including democracy.

A non-exploitative society is an - "association, in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all" - as a particularly acute observer once wrote.

[RebelDog]

Do all capitalists gain their wealth through exploitation of other people?

No, some people work for themselves and keep all the profit for themselves (petty bourgeois)


Also, if wealth is inherited, does the person who actually inherits it automatically become a capitalist, maybe to increase his/her wealth etc.


No different people will always do different things with the money. If they take the money and use it to exploit workers then they are a capitalist. If they do not use the money it does not mean their hands are clean as their wealth was still gained through exploitation of the working class. Capital is dead labour as Marx said.


Is it possible that high levels of wealth can be created without exploitation of any kind, either light exploitation or extreme.

Labour creates wealth. All things are worthless until the worker takes it from the ground, sorts it, shapes it, forges it etc. Also where would the market be if the worker in turn did not consume. It would not be exploitation if each had an equal share in what was being produced.


This might be a naive thread, but any help with this query would be helpful.

A very pertinent set of questions that I'm sure Marx must have asked himself at some point.

[Nex]

On a side note the lottery is an egregious system of exploitation.

[Ricardo]

Originally posted by [email protected] 26, 2006 06:43 pm
Ricardo, are you saying this is the only way that people can become rich without exploiting people whatsoever? You didn't elaborate on the question the thread presented.
No, I didn't mean this is the only way one can get rich without exploiting people, I was just saying that you aren't exploiting anybody if you hit the lottery.

[Nex]

But you are supporting and encouraging a system of exploitation by playing the lottery which is really just as bad. The wealthy capitalists do not play the lottery they make money off the workers that play the lottery. Every worker that wins the lottery speads false hope to others that they might escape their life through the same means, and thus encourages the vicious cycle.