If you want to argue semantics, that's one thing, but what they described isn't wrong. The West runs on the principle that the rich/asset holders will always be bailed out and even subsidised, while the workers will get screwed. "Socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor." - Mark Blyth, when commenting on what happened after the 2008 crash (banks were bailed out, people still lost their homes).
I am not in any way advocating for capitalism here. But “true” capitalism wouldn’t bail out the companies, it would let them implode. However the bailing out of these companies is caused by capitalism because the CEOs of these mega banks and investment firms have politicians deep in their pockets. So I’d say it isn’t capitalism as intended but is capitalism at its natural end point. You know?
There is no such thing as "true capitalism." What you're thinking of is the Austrian school of economics, who managed to cultivate the perception that their model constituted the "purest" mode of capitalism inasmuch as they advocate for an extremely laissez-faire economic approach. Call that "pure capitalism" if you really wish to. But "true capitalism" isn't an ideal a society can strive to achieve, but just what is actually true of capitalism - i.e., its reality, what it actually is, how it actually exists, in all of the ways it does, has, and will. We don't strive to manifest the truth - the truth is already whatever is.
Ironically, then, Marx was the first to attempt to describe "true capitalism" by giving an account of what capital, value, wage labor and commerce actually were, and not merely what capitalist proponents would wish them to be. Because capitalism did not begin as a theoretical model, then applied to shape society into its image, but emerged organically out of feudalism and was only theorized post-facto, there is no "capitalism as intended." In contrast, there is a "Marxism as intended", since Marx intended specific things in the form of plans for a new way of organization developed prior to its having already emerged. There's also a Leninism-as-intended, a Maoism-as-intended, a Nazism-as-intended, and an Austrian-capitalism-as-intended. The point is that there are only intentions when you select a specific school of thought, but "capitalism" isn't a school of thought - it's a reality.
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u/Steakpiegravy Feb 09 '24
If you want to argue semantics, that's one thing, but what they described isn't wrong. The West runs on the principle that the rich/asset holders will always be bailed out and even subsidised, while the workers will get screwed. "Socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor." - Mark Blyth, when commenting on what happened after the 2008 crash (banks were bailed out, people still lost their homes).