Capitalism is a fundamentally inhumane system. Corporations controlled by a tiny handful of the ultra-rich monopolise society's wealth, technology and productive power. The land, natural resources, machinery and factories are owned by individuals, the capitalists. And governments in the wealthy countries wage wars on their behalf to control sources of wealth like oil.
While this parasitic minority enrich themselves from corporate profits and live the high life, the vast majority make their living by selling their ability to work to the capitalists. Even if you work for one of the remaining "public" state-owned companies, capitalists still profit from your work via the subsidies governments give big business from the profits of state companies, as well as your taxes.
Those who inhabit the "middle class" — small businesspeople, small farmers and self-employed professionals — all too often find themselves cast into the ranks of those who must sell their labour power to someone else as a result of being squeezed out of the market by big business.
Against the might of giant transnational corporations, there's little room for the "free competition" and "individual success" that form the mythology of capitalism.
As industrial production became bigger and more concentrated, the free competition of early capitalism gave way to monopolisation. Along with giant companies, giant banks came to control the economy, gathering in everyone's savings to be used by capitalists to expand even further. The wealthiest companies soon spread internationally, dominating the world market. Today, these are known as multinational corporations.
Corporate control of technology and finance allowed the developed, industrialised capitalist countries to dominate manufacturing industries. When size alone was not enough, trade blocs and military force were used.
The technology and money needed to industrialise the Third World are monopolised by the multinational companies based in the rich countries. The 1993 United Nations World Investment Report stated that 90% of the world's 37,000 multinational corporations had their headquarters in the developed capitalist countries. To extract the raw materials and sell agricultural products to the developed countries, Third World economies must work through the multinationals, who take most of the profits. Then, the finished products, the manufactured goods, are sold back to the Third World at a huge profit. Multinationals have been able to use their monopoly power to make Third World nations sell their raw materials for less and less.
This system of international economic control, reinforced by military force when needed, is known as imperialism.
While capitalist corporations become bigger and bigger, more people become poorer. More than 2.8 billion people, close to half the world's population, live on less than US$2 a day. More than 1.2 billion people, or about 20% of the world's population, live on less than US$1 a day.
Instead of getting help from the industrialised countries, Third World countries are drained of their wealth by the imperialist powers. Between 1982 and 1996, Latin America repaid US$740 billion in debt, more than double the $300 billion that was owed in 1982. Yet the debt has not diminished, increasing to $607 billion due to large rises in interest rates at the behest of First World investors.
The UN Human Development Report (2000) stated that the ratio between the incomes of the richest and poorest countries was 3:1 in 1820, 35:1 in 1950, 44:1 in 1973 and 72:1 in 1992.
At the beginning of this decade, the average income in the Third World was just 6% of the average income in the rich imperialist countries. According to the 1998 UN Human Development Report, the richest 225 individuals in the world own as much wealth as the poorest 2.5 billion.
The international gap between rich and poor countries mirrors the gap between rich and poor that grows continually within all capitalist countries. In Britain, the wealthiest 1% own more than 20% of the national wealth, while the poorest 50% own only 7%.
Today in the US, around a quarter of a million people are millionaires, while 2-3 million are homeless. According to 2003 US census figures, around 12.3% of the population (about 35 million people) survive on incomes below the official poverty line.
In Australia, major-party politicians and the corporate-owned media like to say that here "we are" more egalitarian. Because so many middle and working-class Australians own small numbers of shares, we're supposed to be a "shareholder democracy". But what these preachers-for-capitalism don't mention is that 60% of the shares listed on the Australian stock exchange are owned by just 45,000 people — less than 0.25% of the population. Meanwhile, 2 million Australians live in poverty. That's what they mean by "equality".
[Abridged from What Resistance Stands For, available from Resistance Bookshops. See listing on page 2 or visit <http://www.resistance.org.au>.]
From Green Left Weekly, March 22, 2006.
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