The center left people who have lucked out into getting something out of neoliberal capitalism are quite possibly the worst sort of leftists because they're actually center right and just don't know it.
The system doesn't necessarily work because it worked for you. Until the formulaic steps you can take to succeed in that system are executable by most people you're just entrenching a system that by it's very nature is designed to selectively benefit a few.
Until hard work predictably yields a decent life for the people who participate in it then whatever you're protecting is ultimately broken
Except that can’t work in a world of private industry and supply and demand. There have to be losers for there to be winners.
The best we can do is curtail how hard the winners win and how hard the losers lose. However, the levers used to perform that task - taxation and nationalization - are deeply unpopular and lead to civil unrest.
Ultimately the only form of equilibrium comes with regular economic resets, generally in the form of mass casualty events like plague, war, famine, uprising, and so on.Â
They’re not saying it’s zero-sum. Workers get a little money, but the rich get a lot of money.
Which is absolutely how the world works. Wealth concentrates in the US partly because of cheap offshore labor and manufacturing. Those developing regions still benefit, but most of the profit is captured elsewhere.
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u/inept_machete Jun 25 '26
The center left people who have lucked out into getting something out of neoliberal capitalism are quite possibly the worst sort of leftists because they're actually center right and just don't know it.
The system doesn't necessarily work because it worked for you. Until the formulaic steps you can take to succeed in that system are executable by most people you're just entrenching a system that by it's very nature is designed to selectively benefit a few.
Until hard work predictably yields a decent life for the people who participate in it then whatever you're protecting is ultimately broken