Inequality and the unfree market [View all]

[TexasTowelie]

While the public discussion about inequality continues to gather momentum, a trio of books exploring the issue from different angles is getting a lot of attention. The most widely known is Thomas Piketty's Capital in the 21st Century--the two others are Matt Taibbi's The Divide: American Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap and David Cay Johnston's Divided: The Perils of Our Growing Inequality.

Looming behind both the specific cases made in each of these books and the more general discussions about inequality are questions that socialists have been focused on for many years.

Capitalism has undoubtedly produced wealth, technological innovation and consumer goods on a historically unprecedented scale, but it is also associated with exploitation, inequality and economic crisis. Are these defects the result of attempts to meddle with capitalism's free market, as the system's defenders claim? Or are exploitation and inequality an inescapable and, in fact, necessary component of actually existing capitalism, as its critics contend?

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FOR THE economists who defend capitalism, the free market itself is a realm of freedom and equality, evaluating and rewarding--or not rewarding--individuals' economic contributions on the basis of their worth. If some people can't make ends meet, that can be explained as the product of individual failings. Attempts to address social problems, if they impede the functioning of free markets, can only make the situation worse.

The complete article is at http://socialistworker.org/2014/05/29/inequality-and-unfree-market .