this post was submitted on 14 Dec 2024
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Source ?
One of the most basic economic arguments of Marx's Capital is that 1) firms compete for higher profit margins 2) it is easiest to reduce wages in order to increase margins 3) you only have to pay workers enough that they're able to, as a whole, maintain your workforce (the available workforce in general can shrink though, especially as automation shrinks the needed size of the workforce)
Throw in some accumulation by disposession theory(the need to proletarianize the population, separating them from ownership of their own means of subsistence) in order for capitalism to function, and you have good old social murder, the end result of a system designed for efficient accumulation without consideration for human suffering outside the practical consideration of stability.
Socialism, which is designed to manage the needs of a population through democratic processes, does not have this issue, except in the context of fighting capitalism where accumulation needs to be prioritized to some extent, in order to defend their social project from covert and overt hostility by existing capitalist powers.
I've cited Capital, you only really need the first dozen or so chapters to understand the primary argument. Marx provides detailed figures to cite his arguments. I would also suggest reading about accumulation by dispossession/primitive accumulation, social murder, and siege socialism.
There is one very basic problem with the source here: Marx is not a capitalist, and,
Marxist interpretation of capitalist theory ≠ capitalist theory.
Sure, but it is incentivized by capitalism as a real system that exists and is studied. It doesn't have to exist in capitalist theory for it to be a real phenomenon that has be empirically proven.
if you had to pick one and reject the other, which one of the following would rather you pick :
The former option. Why, would you pick the latter option?
Yes.
At their heart, both capitalism and marxism are ideologies describing how things "ought to be." Proponents of either of them seek to influence political decision making around economic decisions, but neither is/was/will be reality.
Capitalism postulates that all capital ought to be privately owned and working in individual interest, while communism postulates that bulk of capital ought to be institutionally owned but working for public interest.
Capitalists believe that capital is most efficiently allocated (returns most value) when its owner spends it for his own benefit, rather than spending it on benefit of others, and that growth of any economy is maximum when capital is allocated most efficiently.
Communists dismiss this by pointing out that inequal access to capital causes internal problems in society, which ultimately culminates to violence aiming to change the capital allocation system into more equal one.
Communism predicts the end of capitalism, while later flavours of capitalism do the same for communism.
No, Marxism does not just describe things as they ought to be. It's main aspects are:
Anthropological: a methodology for understanding how capitalism happens and how it changes to suit changing conditions (many of which it brings about)
Scientific: a process based ideology for developing an understanding of our local conditions and our ability to change them through sociological investigation, mediated through democratic process
The political program extends from an understanding of those two aspects, and is very variable, because the programs are applied to the local conditions of their environments.
No, that strain of bourgeois thought died out as a ruling ideology hundreds of years ago, when state intervention in some failed ventures if the west indies trading company demonstrated that it is more profitable for capitalism to maintain a strong state to protect profits.
I mean yeah but that's not the main thing. The main thing that Marxists believe is that as capitalism moves into its monopoly stage, it ceases to be a historically progressive force (in opposition to feudalism) and it starts to be fettered by its own issues, just like feudalism was.
Marxists believe that as production becomes socialized and planned, capitalist control makes these socialized production processes inefficient and ultimately leads to a cycle of crises.
You describe science as "a process based ideology" with an aim. Science is seldom described as an ideology. What is your source here? Or, if this is an original idea, can you expand upon what your concept of science as such, is?
There are issues with the other "aspects" of Marxism you briefed above; most salient one being the attempt to infer principles of economics from anthropology (which isn't a particularly robust academic field by itself, devoid of any power to make good predictions in its own field, let alone in others), but I'd avoid opening that at the moment as considerations of "what science is" run deeper.
Source, please; and unambiguously capitalist one?
Criticism of monopoly is not a criticism of capitalism. In fact, capitalist theory itself doesn't view monopoly as a good condition. Capitalism prescribes competition and open market - for both buyer and seller sides.
What safegaurds does Marxism/Communism has to prevent monopoly?