KurtFF8
15th January 2009, 23:34
I've often heard the period of post WWII up to the 1960s called the "Golden Age of Capitalism" for the West. This strikes me as quite interesting as this period is quite limited in terms of unrest, labor problems, etc.
While according to Richard Wolff (in his lecture "Capitalism hits the fan"), wages had been increasing relative to capitalist profit from the late 1800s until the 1970s in America, but in the period of the 1800s until the WWII years America for example there were mass labor uprisings and organizing.
And we've all become quite familiar with the nature of the 1970s until today that has seen wage stagnation and the various problems that have come with that in places like America.
So it seems that Capitalism's "Golden Age" was quite limited in history and is certainly not a story of constant progress (as we well know, but this may come as a surprise to many non-leftists or capitalist apologists).
This makes me wonder how some of you would compare capitalism's golden age with the Socialist golden ages (e.g. the 30s and I believe there was a boom in the USSR around the same time of the "Golden Age of Capitalism").
While according to Richard Wolff (in his lecture "Capitalism hits the fan"), wages had been increasing relative to capitalist profit from the late 1800s until the 1970s in America, but in the period of the 1800s until the WWII years America for example there were mass labor uprisings and organizing.
And we've all become quite familiar with the nature of the 1970s until today that has seen wage stagnation and the various problems that have come with that in places like America.
So it seems that Capitalism's "Golden Age" was quite limited in history and is certainly not a story of constant progress (as we well know, but this may come as a surprise to many non-leftists or capitalist apologists).
This makes me wonder how some of you would compare capitalism's golden age with the Socialist golden ages (e.g. the 30s and I believe there was a boom in the USSR around the same time of the "Golden Age of Capitalism").