log entry ID: ....a.r.i 2026-02-01 14:44:16 EETI have always thought there was something odd about the word capitalism. The more I heard it or read it, the less sense it made. Then it hit me: To certain types of people, capitalism is just their word for everything they like about the economy. To others, it is just their word for everything in the economy they don’t like. In both cases, the things they are calling capitalism are not actually capitalism. Usually.
To its supporters, what they call “capitalism” is usually actually just free markets. Sure, capitalism can’t exist without free markets, but
free markets can exist without capitalism!
To its detractors, “capitalism” is their catch-all term that sometimes means environmental degradation, other times worker exploitation, materialism, consumerism, or individualism. Guess what.
All that shit is totally possible in a communist economy. Well, except individualism. That would be a little weird. But for sure, though, the worst worker exploitation and environmental degradation both happened in the Soviet Union. (To those who read the second link: bet you were expecting Chernobyl, weren’t you? But that was nothing compared to the worst thing the Union did to the enviroment.)
Capitalism is, specifically, the ability of private individuals to buy and sell companies.
The stock market is capitalist. “Venture capitalism” actually does mean capitalism. Company mergers, hostile takeovers, oligopolies, and monopolies are the direct result of the ability of private people to buy and sell companies. They are therefore capitalist.
Anti-monopoly and anti-trust legislation puts limitations on private people’s rights to trade companies. Therefore, these laws actually are anti-capitalist. Even the US has these laws, thus ostensibly would not be completely capitalist, if these laws were actually enforced.
Well, I don’t like your definition of capitalism. It’s overly broad. To its supporters, it can be used as marketing for just about any kind of ecomomic fucketry. To its detractors, it allows for a never-ending crusade against an increasingly imaginary evil that will never be defeated. “Well, there’s still a long way to go, until capitalism is finally defeated.” And there always will be.
For all of the people who are actually interested in solving real problems, and who aren’t just fishing for support for their values and for their world view: the narrow definition serves us best. It points to something valuable to appreciate and save. It points to something concrete to fight and destroy. And when it’s gone, it will really be gone. Victory is actually possible.
I think it is mostly a bad idea. Mostly.
It has proven to be a highly effective way for companies to secure financing. A company can conjure a bunch of stocks, and sell them in exchange for some control over the company. The company can use the money to grow, then buy the stocks back with interest proportional to the increase in the value of the company. Effectively, it empowers “regular people” (lol, not in practice, but at least in principle) to lend money with interest to companies they like. This is kinda clever! How could I not appreciate this?
The problem is the control. This is all predicated on the assumption that a company should be solely controlled by some kind of owners. Who is missing from this? The employees, of course. Where is their say in the future of their company? Unless they have stock too (again, lol), they have none.
This leads to some bad places. When owner J sells company T to owner E, what is owner E getting? Control over T’s operations, T’s assets, and T’s labour force.
J has effectively sold E “his” employees.
It might not be slavery, but boy, does it ever rhyme. Sure T’s employees can resign if they don’t like the company’s new direction, but come on. Some employees just don’t know. Many just don’t care. Others can’t afford to go unemployed, even if they do care. And, then of course, there are bitches like E, who actively fire all employees trying to spread the word about what E is doing to T. Then, just for fun, E renames T to X.
I believe this is deeply unjust. It should be illegal for employees not to have at least enough control to block this kind of total exchange of owners. Anybody reading this in Germany is likely to agree with me.
Because as a matter of fact, this is exactly how it works in Germany. It’s called Mitbestimmung, or codetermination.
Mitbestimmungsgesetz 1976 or the Codetermination Act 1976 is a German law that requires companies of over 2000 employees to have half the supervisory board of directors as representatives of workers, and just under half the votes. —Mitbestimmungsgesetz, Wikipedia
That makes it virtually impossible for a company to undergo any foundational decision without the support of the employees.
In this way, strict capitalism is already illegal in Germany. Instead, they have a hybrid system, and it seems to be working pretty well.
So, hey. Next time the economy gets you down, you’re looking for name of the source of your misery, and you’re reaching for that “C” word, remember this log entry. And if it really is capitalism, maybe also think twice about that other “C” word. There’s more than one way to fight capitalism. Try a little Mitbestimmung!
Well, sure the example with J, T, and E is bad, but that could have been avoided, if everybody had conducted themselves more responsibly in the first place! You said yourself that regular people have the power to buy stocks. Everybody should have stocks in the company they work for, along with any other company whose future they care about, and want to control. Everybody is responsible to be aware of what is going on inside the leadership of their own company. —you, maybe.
To you, I say: Do you have any idea what it is you are asking of the average person?! I’ve got a thing or two to tell you too. That will have to wait for next week, though. Or maybe the week after. I don’t know. What am I? A serious reliable writer? lol