Yeah, buying out competition and lobbying to try and make your business more monopolistic is somehow a special kind of “evil” (I love moralism) and definitely not something that’s allowed and actively encouraged by the system where the goal is to get as much profit as possible. But sure, it’s a personal failing.
Heres a radical new idea: what if every single business owner, regardless of their wealth, is exploitative and therefore “evil” not because of their personal choices but because of how wages and profit works on a systemic basis? Workers do all the labor, the business owner gets all the value from that labor and abusing the fact that they own the means of production, they only pay workers a flat wage which is meant to merely “refresh their labor power”. Its textbook exploitation and the basis for how capitalists get their wealth.
Though if you’re gonna moralize capitalists, I’d argue small business owners are more “evil” than any other strata - they don’t have the capital to fail and recover or start anew, so they’re constantly on the verge of bankruptcy which would have their biggest fear come into fruition which is not becoming homeless, but getting a job like the rest of unwashed masses. They have legal exemptions in terms of discrimination, they’re notoriously shit to work in because you get worked like a mule, and historically they’ve been primary supporters of Hitler, Mussolini, even Trump given their precarious economic position making them reactionary.
Are you incapable of holding two ideas in your head simultaneously? I agree that capitalism / the relationship between employers and their employees is inherently exploitative and I’m opposed to all forms of unaccountable hierarchy. I also believe capitalism places capital owners in a position to make a lot of moral decisions and that they can make better or worse ones, even if what they are doing is morally compromising from the outset.
To give a clear and exaggerated example, imagine a slaver who owns a few slaves that they treat with backhanded politeness and allow to stay in a room of their mansion and eat with them, and a slaver who owns dozens of slaves on a plantation that they regularly abuse physically and mentally and are kept in a shitty barracks with a dirt floor and fed scraps. Both are engaging in a morally repugnant one-sided and non-consensual relationship, but one is clearly worse than the other. It doesn’t make it excusable, but people in a position of power and authority over others can make better or worse moral decisions, even if the fact that they are allowed to make them unilaterally is morally wrong in itself.
Yeah, buying out competition and lobbying to try and make your business more monopolistic is somehow a special kind of “evil” (I love moralism) and definitely not something that’s allowed and actively encouraged by the system where the goal is to get as much profit as possible. But sure, it’s a personal failing.
Heres a radical new idea: what if every single business owner, regardless of their wealth, is exploitative and therefore “evil” not because of their personal choices but because of how wages and profit works on a systemic basis? Workers do all the labor, the business owner gets all the value from that labor and abusing the fact that they own the means of production, they only pay workers a flat wage which is meant to merely “refresh their labor power”. Its textbook exploitation and the basis for how capitalists get their wealth.
Though if you’re gonna moralize capitalists, I’d argue small business owners are more “evil” than any other strata - they don’t have the capital to fail and recover or start anew, so they’re constantly on the verge of bankruptcy which would have their biggest fear come into fruition which is not becoming homeless, but getting a job like the rest of unwashed masses. They have legal exemptions in terms of discrimination, they’re notoriously shit to work in because you get worked like a mule, and historically they’ve been primary supporters of Hitler, Mussolini, even Trump given their precarious economic position making them reactionary.
Are you incapable of holding two ideas in your head simultaneously? I agree that capitalism / the relationship between employers and their employees is inherently exploitative and I’m opposed to all forms of unaccountable hierarchy. I also believe capitalism places capital owners in a position to make a lot of moral decisions and that they can make better or worse ones, even if what they are doing is morally compromising from the outset.
To give a clear and exaggerated example, imagine a slaver who owns a few slaves that they treat with backhanded politeness and allow to stay in a room of their mansion and eat with them, and a slaver who owns dozens of slaves on a plantation that they regularly abuse physically and mentally and are kept in a shitty barracks with a dirt floor and fed scraps. Both are engaging in a morally repugnant one-sided and non-consensual relationship, but one is clearly worse than the other. It doesn’t make it excusable, but people in a position of power and authority over others can make better or worse moral decisions, even if the fact that they are allowed to make them unilaterally is morally wrong in itself.