Saving Capitalism

I just finished reading Robert Reich's latest, Saving Capitalism for the Many, not the Few. He talks of a time when capitalism worked in the US, when there were countervailing forces like trade associations and unions to balance the capitalists. When there was a healthy middle class, where there was less income inequality and more and better social safety nets. He thinks because it used to be that it can be again if we but stand up and fight for our rights.


And he accepts that capitalists are just doing what is natural to capitalism and it would be ok if we just reinstituted those countervailing forces again. But the premise is wrong because what is now is the exact result of a defunct system that indeed is doing what is natural to it. It would have done so long before had it not been for those countervailing forces, but the latter have been destroyed beyond repair never to see the light of day again. It is capitalism that has to go. It is beyond saving. We can't go back to a better capitalism. The capitalists will see to that.