• solstice@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    14
    arrow-down
    7
    ·
    1 year ago

    Markets are not always fair or efficient but that doesn’t mean capitalism is a pyramid scheme. It is still very much the opposite.

    • KirbyQK@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      13
      arrow-down
      5
      ·
      1 year ago

      Unregulated capitalism places all of the power in the hands of the wealthy. Even with the amount of regulation in place, the last 4 decades has irrefutably proven that. The transfer of wealth from the bottom 95% to the top 5% has has been insane.

      The only reason we need so much regulation is because people are garbage and if they can gain something for nothing, they will. You cannot consider the pure idea of capitalism without also considering the reality of human nature, that it is inherently going to create a pyramid scheme like situation where the top transfer power and wealth to themselves in the largest quantities they can, in spite of pesky things like laws and taxes.

      • markr@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        9
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        Yes that is true, and you can view wealth distribution as pyramid shaped, but that is not what a pyramid scheme means. As noted the system is very good at producing massive amounts of commodities, distributing them all over the planet, and exchanging them for your labor. If capitalism did nothing useful it would have disappeared long ago.

        • msage@programming.dev
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          4
          arrow-down
          3
          ·
          1 year ago

          Global south would like a word.

          Like every proponent of capitalism ignores the cheap labor and blatant theft of natural resources the rich nations need to make the line go up.

          It’s not the virtue of capitalism that makes our lives so luxurious. It’s the suffering of the rest of the world.

            • msage@programming.dev
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              1
              ·
              1 year ago

              So the first developed countries destroyed the environment just to get extra virtual numbers shown somewhere, and the rest, even though they directly or indirectly participated, got pollution, slavery, famine, but that is not a pyramid scheme?