In the last 5 to 10 years everything seems to suck: product’s and services quality plummeted, everything from homes to cars to food became really expensive, technology stopped to help us to be something designed to f@ck with us and our money, nobody seems to be able to hold a job anymore, everyone is broke. Life seems worse in general.
Why? Did COVID made this happen? How?
Because corporate greed and the economic elite around the world hoarding more resources than ever before.
And we let them.
We don’t just let them, we cheer them on. Look at the celebrity worship culture we humans have. If you took away the person and left only their actions, most of us would happily throw the rich into a woodchipper. But they use their money to convince us that they’re special and deserve praise, and most of us go along with it because we’re sheep.
Pioneer woman.
She’s got a huge ranch a huge house a specialty made kitchen just for her show… works super hard to look blue collar.
It’s all crafted to separate you from your money…
I found out recently that the land that her ranch sits on is at least adjacent to, if not directly involved in the events shown in Killers of the Flower Moon.
While I agree her image is at the very least somewhat exaggerated, her net worth probably puts her somewhere in the top 10%. She’s not exactly the powerful elite.
Rae Drummond has a reported net worth of approx $65m as of last year.
The top 1% of United States net worth starts at $12m. She is just inside the top 0.1% of us net worth which starts at $62m.
Hell, her last name alone gives it away.
The Drummond family is one of the wealthiest families in Oklahoma, owning hundreds of thousands of acres of land.
Wealthy enough they have their own Wikipedia page.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drummond_family_(Oklahoma)
She’s married into one of the wealthiest families in Oklahoma.
Completely excluding the tens of millions she herself is worth from her business.
That is such a lazy argument. More people then ever before are out of poverty in the history of mankind. Doesn’t mean there are not problems. In regards to COVID, we took millions of people out of the workforce while printing money and still paying many of them? Of course that will result in massive reduction of inventory levels that we will feel for a decade. That results in inflation as what do people expect when less items available to the same amount of people that want them.
Regards to qualities etc. That varies. We have more access to products then at anytime in history as well. And many of these products have come down significantly in price. But that also means quality products and their prices get compared to shit products at lower prices. What do you think people buy? Secondary, people do far less informal work and that effects your perception of income. Our parents and grandparents maintained their own cars and houses for example and grew far more food. Now every hires that out and buys all their groceries at a store. That leaves you with far less money.
Then there is one industry that has made gains but their costs has gone up ten fold. That is healthcare. You have access to some of the best medical procedures then at anytime in history. But some of those costs can be North of a million dollars. Our parents and grandparents simply did not access that and in some cases died. I am happy I have now options but this is coming at a huge cost of which much of it has to be paid for upfront before you retire.
You could kill off every billionaire tomorrow but that won’t result in much more houses being built or available. Wealth inequality is an issue but if more cogs are not manufactured, our standard of living will not change much.
People in cities have not sustained on growing their own foods for hundreds of years. Refined crops and goods have been machined into the cities ever since the industrial revolution and before that it was farmers that brought their goods to be sold at the markets. The greatest achievement of humanity over other species on the planet is our ability to delegate and cooperate. You grow food, I make tools. Together we thrive.
Yep, you have a rampant problem with housing and healthcare over there in America-land, I agree. But why is that? Because of massive hoarding of resources. Human essentials and needs are commoditized like a “smart” investment for the ruthless opportunists. Hell, your entire societal system is built around it, and it’s spilling into the rest of the world. It’s a dog eat dog economy that is hailed like an ideology by useful idiots bought by the elites by the trickling of pocket change. Then the ideology has been turned into a culture of over consumption, again hailed by other useful idiots to convince the regular people that it will give them purpose, fill the hole, numb the pain of the aimless grind for nothing meaningful ever. And who does all of this benefit? Where do all this wealth and all these resources end up that could transform the entire planet for something that benefits all mankind? To the owners of the owners of the owners, and the money that doesn’t crawl it’s way up is a good investment to keep the system intact.
But no, let’s concentrate on the tools we use and not what they do. Let’s focus on the monetary system. Let’s get stuck in inflation and regression and unfortunate loopholes “but-what-can-you-do” and tax havens and desired unemployment rates and spoiling of food while people are starving - for the economy. Everything can be explained with the economy, and if you disagree you’re clearly uninformed or ignorant don’t have enough the smarts.
People have done the double think and now the economy is no longer the tool, is no longer a representation, but it is the real thing. And more so the current economic system is forever and eternal and unchangeable like the word of God.
It’s funny and sad that people actually believe this is all there is.
Unregulated capitalism…
This is the natural result of that.
COVID factored in because the handful of corporations that own a shit ton of companies figured out 8% inflation could be used as justification to double/triple prices, and if they all did it, consumers had no options.
In regulated capitalism, the government would step in to prevent this type of price fixing.
But when both political parties are “pro business” and take donations from those huge corporations…
Then corporations get away with lots they shouldn’t
Covid made things worse, but the fundamentals were bad.
We are in the middle of a massive tightening of the labor market as boomers retire and there aren’t enough young adults to fill the gap. This is causing major ripples in the market, with a very antagonistic relationship forming between capital trying to keep labor costs down and labor tired of the bullshit.
This is causing some mild inflation, so companies are jacking up prices since they have an excuse to. This increased inflation is making the time value of money cost more. So now you have companies that were losing money having to scramble to finally generate a profit. This is causing the enshittification of the Internet and the loss of jobs in the tech sector.
The worse economy is causing political problems as it is harder for politicians to justify their positions in power. This encourages conflict between nations and the justification to deny some people of social benefits to create an underclass to benefit voters.
I agree with this, and I’d like to add that the wealth gap focusing on funneling money to the top is obviously not helping the quality of products, responsible production , or fair compensation for most of the world.
Yeah, but I’m trying to explain why it is happening. You’ve hit market saturation in so many companies when the only way to fuel growth now is to reduce costs.
Cumulative generational focus on acquiring and consolidating capital explains the why comprehensively, at least in the states.
Monopolies, market saturation, minimizing cost at all costs, poor labor compensation are all symptoms of a system focused primarily on acquiring and consolidating capital.
Capitalism. The longer Capitalism exists, the more it has to find new ways to stop/slow its own built-in death clock. If it doesn’t, it dies, due to problems like the Tendency for the Rate of Profit to Fall and rising disparity. Enshittification, so to speak.
With each economic disaster, the wealthiest of the bourgeoisie can claim large swaths of cheaper Capital at a discount, compounding the issue into a form of neo-feudalism that will eventually collapse under its own weight.
God forbid a post-scarcity world where the only currency is our reputation, honor, and credibility.
Make it so number one.
Hehehehe it started there but took an Orville hard left
Alas, the alternative to capitalism has never been socialism, but feudalism.
Late stage capitalism
Things have been going great in non-capitalist societies?
Non-Capitalist societies face entirely different issues, usually due to lack of development. They don’t quite face the same issues of enshittification that developed Capitalist countries are currently seeing.
Shareholder value. Companies are cutting everything they can to increase stakeholder value: wages, quality, support, ownership, etc.
The question “Why has the world gone to shit in the past 5 to 10 years” has routinely been asked every five to ten years throughout history. It’s largely due to the perceptual biases of the human mind.
That’s true, but the information age allows us to be more keenly aware of problems that aren’t just local. Our new ability to be online has contributed to an uptick in mental health issues.
Fortunately, being able to shine a spotlight on problems in the world also puts pressure on us to improve. We do have issues like financial inequality and global warming that have recently gotten worse, but if you look at trends like violent crime, illiteracy, global hunger, extreme poverty, child mortality, or deaths to many longstanding diseases, it is hard not to realize that we’re actually collectively doing a good job of making the world better.
One of the major reasons is that Milton Friedman had a thought back in the 70s that fucking everyone in the western world latched onto, and the consequences have been getting worse and worse for the average person for most of the time since then.
Of course, neoliberals don’t actually believe in neoliberalism, they profit off it’s failure.
If you give a rich person even more money and it never trickles down, you just gave a rich person money. If you’re claim companies will regulate themselves and they don’t, you just gave companies the freedom to do exploitative, dangerous things in search of bigger profits.
If neoliberalism actually delivered on any of its promises, neoliberals wouldn’t support it.
It’s nothing more than a book of pre-made lies that sound plausible enough for a press conference and signal to other neoliberals that their feeding trough is being filled.
Knew the what. Not the how/why we got there. Thanks for sharing.
Indeed. Knowing how we got here is the first step to fixing it.
Shareholder primacy is older than that. Check out Dodge v. Ford
Sure, but him writing that op-ed in the NYT popularized it to the degree that it became an explicit goal of pretty much all corporate leadership people from that point on.
I think the enshitification of the Internet was sort of just what happens to everything once it gets monetized. It was already happening before COVID.
On the other hand - when I was growing up, my city was rough. So much violent crime, bands would not come here, it was notorious. Now? No. Violet crime has decreased sharply, my kids grew up in a different world than I did.
Jobs haven’t become less secure, or at least not in my experience, that change happened in the 1980s, and it’s been about the same since.
Everyone is broke because of Ronald Reagan, for lack of a better way to explain it. Deregulation. Workers have gotten ever more productive without getting their cut of that increase in productivity and this is the endgame of that trend.
The rise in interest rates meant easy money dried up for corporations. They all had to “monitize” at the same time. That’s why enshitification happened everywhere at the same time. Things are easing. Enshitification will slow down.
Things were getting really good in the late 1990’s to early 2000’s. Pay was up, more people were making money and starting companies.
Then 2008 happened.
Since then the lower 99% have been fighting over less and less. Some people try to build, but it often gets destroyed by others. Some take their anger out on the physically near them.
Every major crisis, the bourgeoisie claim more and more while the Proletariat loses more and more, because they have to spend their money on survival while the wealthy can swoop in and claim cheap Capital.
Then 2008 happened.
I am going to assume you reference the financial meltdown that had been brewing for years and had been fore-ordained by the weakening of regulations by prior administrations… correct?
edit: but, of course it could also he the incoherent rage of the right over a non-white president. so many options, so little thoughtfulness from a certain segment of the electorate.
They’re obviously talking about the recession. You’re ascribing malice for absolutely no reason in an attempt to distract from economic realities
I was honestly ascribing nothing to the parent comment. it was a genuine request for clarification (with a little editorializing of my own).
if my comment was not to your liking, then so be it, but I assure you that no malice was intended.
I meant the financial meltdown. I debated calling it the 2007, as that is when the cracks started. I acknowledge that the financial meltdown has is roots far earlier, but all financial meltdowns do.
You missed the 80’s. The 90’s could’ve been even better if it didn’t get fucked by Conservatives.
You’re finally realizing the end game of capitalism. The 1% trying to hoard everything and milk 99% of the population. I call them piggies because they’re gluttonous with money.
Edit: you’re
I think it is the natural result of capitalism, that’s what happens when you let it run. The system makes it inevitable.
Yeah, this is why capitalism should be treated like a dangerous dog and kept on a short leash. It can kind of work out for a while when a government restrains it, ensures that legislation exists and is enforced to protect workers, the environment, and consumers. Strong unions are a good sign. This never seems to last though, because the governments get bought eventually.
Thing is most people on earth would do the same if given the opportunity to become ultra wealthy.
The issue is the system allows people to become ultra wealthy
The issue with the system is that we are locked within it. You can’t escape capitalism. It has superseded law. We are just tumbling around in the algorithm.
No, most people would not.
Most people would share, or hit a point and think “OK, that’s enough for anything I really want personally… I’m gonna try and help out now…”
Nobody in their right mind should want a world where they are privately wealthy, but publically impoverished.
Because then, you have no security.
Someone will always be gunning for you.
You can stave it off by layering brute force, and laws, but there is no such thing as 100% secure. Eventually something will make it through, and wreak havoc. And because all you now care about, over everything, is whatever paltry “wealth” you’ve managed to secure, the catastrophe is magnified orders of magnitude. You have no real friends or community to turn to, nobody who would support you if you didn’t have the most, and the rules didn’t make you “king” because of it.It’s a sickness.
We live in the materialistic era of wanting more. Given minimal effort, the overwhelming majority of people would not stop until they have tens or hundreds of millions of net worth.
No matter what you say you’re just wrong
Nah, only about 5% of the population have antisocial personality disorders. That’s a lot of people, but not “most.”
But is it possible that extreme wealth breeds antisocial disorders? Think about it–how does a normal person justify having more money than they could ever spend? You have to separate yourself from the average person, or otherwise think you somehow deserve it (while others suffer).
Extreme wealth is poison, both for the wealthy and for the exploited.
I think of it like the Stanford Prison Experiment. As a human, we are meant to play roles in a hierarchical structure.
So if I put you in a role, certain parts of your personality are going to come out subconsciously. You become the right person to fit the role.
Pretty much like you said- if you are given wild amounts of money you start to justify it and become someone else.
Yeah, I agree. Our economic system and some of our culture encourages and rewards antisocial behavior.
If Jeff bezoz offered you his position in Amazon along with his entire net worth, do you think you (or 19/20 people) would disband that privileged position down to a point where no one would think you’re ultra rich poison?
No, most would give away some but continue to live a overly luxurious lifestyle. My point is proven because it’s the same reason why people enter the lottery, for extreme wealth
Eh, I’m not sure what position Bezos has now. If I ran Amazon, I’d probably covertly support unionization of the entire workforce. I don’t really care about a luxurious lifestyle, and don’t plan on having kids to give an inheritance to, so yeah, I’d probably just give almost all away and buy a small farm to garden in and work on open source projects or something. Like, that’s my dream. It would actually be really hard to figure out how to give all that money away. Could provide the initial funding to like 100,000 decently sized worker-coops I guess.
Edit: I should say, I don’t think most people care so little about luxury and money as I do. My problem is not so much about people having wealth (though wealth is a limited resources, so that does mean others will not have it), but my problem is what people do to get such wealth. It usually involves deceiving your network of associates and exploiting your employees. I do not think most people would be ok with forcing their employees to shit in bags.
Who came up with the “end game”? O.o
For the US it all started (well more accelerated) with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC#Opinion_of_the_court and since we have a knock on effect with the rest of the world…
Greed
My “why has the world gone to shit” was the 2007/8 banking crisis when everyone realised that you could pull off any swindle you wanted and no one would stop you. So everyone did/everyone stopped trying to hide it.
So presumably people older than me would point to the start of Trickle Down Economics, and so on
Everyone has their own “None of this works and it’s intentional!” moment
I blame the founders, and everyone after them that worships them.
The powers that be realised that a non-stop feed of bad news for you to Doom scroll makes people apathetic and apethic people don’t protest, or revolt, or even vote against you. They go through life scrolling on their phone and just accept whatever life gives them.
It’s not even a concious conspiracy, it’s just the result of “the attention economy”.
