this post was submitted on 29 Jul 2023
566 points (80.2% liked)
Showerthoughts
29793 readers
673 users here now
A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. A showerthought should offer a unique perspective on an ordinary part of life.
Rules
- All posts must be showerthoughts
- The entire showerthought must be in the title
- Avoid politics
- 3.1) NEW RULE as of 5 Nov 2024, trying it out
- 3.2) Political posts often end up being circle jerks (not offering unique perspective) or enflaming (too much work for mods).
- 3.3) Try c/politicaldiscussion, volunteer as a mod here, or start your own community.
- Posts must be original/unique
- Adhere to Lemmy's Code of Conduct
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
It fundamentally is NOT a pyramid scheme. In a pyramid scheme there is no actual product or service of value and simply extracts wealth from the people in lower tiers. Value, or wealth, is simply the byproduct of an equitable transaction between two or more parties.
Except that you're describing commerce, not capitalism. Capitalism is the idea that the commerce has value, and that one can own the value of the commercial activity. Further, the value of the business is tied to it's growth.
Further, products and services are never exchanged in an equitable transaction between two parties, because capitalism necessitates a third party, the capitalist. The capitalist must acquire products and services from employees for less than their true value, and then sell them to consumers for more than their true value.
And because capitalism demands growth, one or both of those two margins must continue to expand. This means workers must be pressured to work for less and less, which is why the capitalist opposes social services, universal healthcare, and affordable housing. This also means the capitalism opposes consumer protections, environmental protections, and taxes that provide a functioning society that might interfere with their growth.
Now what happens when every producer and consumer is fighting for the same margins, the same advantages, and the same growth? Then the capitalist seeks new avenues for new capital and new capitalists. Building business on ensuring the growth of business for other capitalists. Selling the idea that you, too, can join us at the top of the pyramid, all the while kicking down ladders they climbed to get there.
So no, the system itself isn't a pyramid scheme. It's just an idea that encourages pyramid schemes because it relies on impossible growth, like a cancer eating away at society.
Hang out with small business owners and you'll find lots of examples of two party exchanges. The closest thing to a third party is when there's a contract dispute that involves arbitration or a lawsuit.
This isn't capitalism, this is employment. Employment has been a feature of most economic systems over the past few thousand years. It's important to ignore Marxist theory on employment and alienation because is relies on cherry picking facts to create bizarre and blatantly false narratives.
This sentence also packs in a misunderstanding of how value is generated in all economic systems, not just capitalism. The migrant worker is an economic staple in most (if not all) societies that engaged in agriculture. Take the Roman economy for example, migrant workers lack any property ownership themselves and so must sell labor for money. In the absence of tools, property and seeds, they are not able to generate anything of value for anyone else. A wealthy Roman farm owner has more land than they can work themselves. Without workers, their land has some value, but much less. When the farmer purchases labor for money, more food is produced than was consumed by both parties over that time period. If an excess of food is not generated, then somebody starves. The same thing holds for McDonalds. McDonalds owns a trademark, a marketing organization and a supply chain; all of which are useless without a restaurant. A franchise owner purchases access to the systems that McDonalds owns in order to create a restaurant. The restaurant is useless without a fry cook. The fry cook operates the kitchen gear in the restaurant in order to produce food for consumers. It's important to note that without the restaurant, the marketing and the supply chain, the labor of the fry cook is work very little.
The demand for growth is not specific to capitalism. Economic systems that don't exhibit growth either can't physically support a growing population (with things like food or shelter), or the average standard of living decreases. Both of these situations are difficult to sustain for any political system.