These Are Days...of End Stage Capitalism
In 1992, the band 10,000 Maniacs released the song “These Are Days.” Sung by lead vocalist Natalie Merchant, the song begins,
“These are days you'll remember
Never before and never since
I promise
Will the whole world be warm as this…”
Yet nowadays, these are days of end stage capitalism, a time we would prefer not to remember, because it has made the whole world far from being warm.
You see, capitalism, as experienced in the U.S., has degenerated into a system of a free market on steroids, in which everything is for sale and everything is commodified.
Many people call the current system late stage capitalism.
What we see is that it’s all about the profit motive first and foremost, no matter how much harm it does to others or the environment.
The philosophy of profits over everything else is the main reason the U.S. ranks low on the World Happiness Reports, the yearly report that rates the level of happiness within a country. While European countries rate the highest in the World Happiness Report regarding the happiness level of their citizens, this year the U.S. slipped to number 24, down from the last few year’s rankings at number 18. This puts the U.S. below Slovenia, Czechia, and the United Arab Emirates.
The reason for this low ranking for the U.S. is something the World Happiness Report states on their website: “Should we consider some parts of our society to be ‘off bounds’ to the profit motive, so that we can foster the spirit of cooperation, trust, and community?”
The U.S. fares poorly by this metric of having parts of society off bounds to the profit motive, because in the U.S., as I said above, everything is for sale and very little is considered off bounds to the profit motive.
The approach of late stage capitalism has been building in intensity for the last few decades, and has now reached a crescendo where it has transitioned to end stage capitalism. This is an era in which capitalism is self-immolating, and in the process taking down the social bonds between people, taking down democracy, and taking down the planet.
Late stage capitalism began in the 1970s and took on serious momentum in 1980, when Ronald Reagan became president. And now, as I said, we are in the final days, the end stage.
Karl Marx felt that eventually, capitalism would fail and socialism would replace it. But end stage capitalism is not going toward socialism. It’s going toward a capitalism that eschews democracy and embraces authoritarianism.
Since we began the era of late stage capitalism, wealth inequality has been one of its defining features. Currently, the richest 0.1% of Americans control $22 trillion in wealth, while the bottom 50% control $3.8 trillion in wealth.
The reason this happened is because Ronald Reagan, through his tax cuts and trickle-down economics philosophy, ended four decades of prosperity for all classes of people, thanks to the high rates of taxation on the wealthy that existed between the 1930s and 1970s. After Reagan began cutting the marginal tax rates on the wealthy, the gap between the rich and everyone else has become a chasm as wide as the Grand Canyon.
The four decades prior to Reagan began with the administration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and his New Deal policies , and continued through Democrat and Republican administrations alike, until Reagan. It was a time of much more fairness and egalitarianism, in which because of the high taxes, economic policies were more redistributive, which created a broad-based prosperity for all.
Now, because things have changed so radically, we have a wealthy elite who no longer care about anything except fattening their bank accounts. They sequester their money all over the world in offshore tax havens, which allows them to pay little to nothing in taxes, and also allows them to shelter their money in secrecy, so that no one knows the exact sum of their fortunes.
And by not paying taxes, monies which would go towards creating a more broad-based economy, they are able to put their money into whatever it is that grabs their fancy, be it owning homes all over the world, yachts, art works, cryptocurrency, or, as we see more and more, influencing public policy.
Their influence of public policy is not out of some benevolent sense of duty to the masses; instead it is to enhance their wealth and keep money out of the hands of those they deem less deserving—to them that means everyone who is not filthy rich like them.
Hence the public display of Elon Musk and his fellow billionaires ripping through the government, slashing jobs, agencies, and services that benefit people.
The wealthy elite no longer see themselves as citizens of any one country; with their wealth stashed in secretive tax havens, with the goal of avoidance of paying taxes, they have liberated themselves from being tied to just one nation.
While these ultrarich expect to enjoy all the benefits of society without paying their fair share of the costs, at the same time they have no faith in democratic processes or the rule of law.
The only laws they feel are necessary are protecting their property rights and enforcing their contracts. They’re just not keen on being subject to the law, or acknowledging their dependence on a free, functional society for their prosperity.
They see themselves as above the law; more specifically, they see themselves as sovereign individuals not tied to any one nation, and with no obligation to anyone but themselves. They also see themselves as morally and intellectually superior to the rest of us; their ultimate power comes from stashing their wealth far away from what they see as the grasping hands of government.
This mentality has been picking up steam since Reagan, and is now an out-of-control locomotive. One of the hallmarks of this epoch is the deregulation of banking, which has unleashed an almost infinite pool of money onto the wealth class.
Currently, the world income is $115 trillion, up from $50 trillion 20 years ago. But more importantly, or to be precise, more surreally, the global money market currently has $750 trillion, up from $70 trillion 20 years ago, circulating around the world.
Where did that money come from and where does it go? Once the banking industry became deregulated in 1999, the trajectory of money in circulation exponentially increased to where it is now. This money has primarily gone to the wealthiest, where they do with it as they please.
End stage capitalism is a product of almost infinite, unfettered money that lands in the pockets of those who already have more money than God. And the goal of those with the money is to keep it out of the hands of the populace that seeks a more equitable present and future.
With end stage capitalism, the ultrarich understand that the unlimited amounts of money that comes their way and that they secret away into offshore money sanctuaries gives them a privilege that, in their minds, graces them with an omnipotent power.
To maintain that privilege, they recognize they have to be protected from democracy, because they see democracy as something that increases the power of the “commoners,” who might vote against the interests of the wealthy elite.
As Patri Friedman, the grandson of the economist Milton Friedman, the father of trickle-down economics, once said, “Democracy is not the answer. It it merely the current industry standard.”
To Patri Friedman and many others who think the same way, the ideal community, region, or nation would be modeled on corporations, in which a C.E.O. would dictate policies.
This is a philosophy that is the predominant point of view among many billionaires, especially those who made their fortunes in Silicon Valley. And they have an ally in Donald Trump, who is smashing the guardrails of democracy as he moves the U.S. in line with authoritarian states like Russia, Hungary, and Turkey.
But this is not a done deal, nor do we have to accept it as a fait accompli. The system is rigged against people, and people are taking notice—millions of people have been taking to the streets to protest against the rigged political and economic system.
We’ve also seen Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez drawing huge crowds around the nation for their Fighting Oligarchy Tour, as they speak about the inequitable system.
And if Americans look back to their history, they will see a role model in one of the most extraordinary speeches ever given, in 1936 by Franklin Roosevelt. It was a speech in which he took on the wealthy interests of the U.S., who he explained were only interested in amassing power in service to fattening their wallets.
FDR’s 1936 speech, given on the eve of his reelection, is known as the “I welcome their hatred” speech. This is a portion of what he said:
“We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace—business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering.
“They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob.
“Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me—and I welcome their hatred.
“I should like to have it said of my first Administration that in it the forces of selfishness and of lust for power met their match. I should like to have it said of my second Administration that in it these forces met their master.”
FDR’s speech is as relevant today as it was then. The forces of money never give up, and they have now taken it to its endgame, that of end stage capitalism, where the monied people could care less if democracy withers away and society collapses; what matters to them is that they have their money stashed away where no one can get it.
People rose up against the monied interests during FDR’s time. It’s time to do it again. The vision of a more fair and just egalitarian democracy is no longer a dream. It’s a reality waiting to happen.
When this happens, the lyrics of “These Are Days,” the 10,000 Maniacs song, will at last ring true and the complete first verse will resonate with what we have the potential as individuals and a society to become:
“These are days you'll remember
Never before and never since
I promise
Will the whole world be warm as this
And as you feel it
You'll know it's true
That you are blessed and lucky
It's true that you
Are touched by something
That will grow in you, in you”