Post Tagged with: "capitalism"
Foxconn and China’s Capitalist Revolution
The promises of reform at Foxconn are the latest of many as China painfully adjusts to the inevitable social realignment that comes with a capitalist economy. What is occurring in China now happened in Europe during the transition from feudal to industrial society. That transition is more germane than it might appear at first blush because over the past two generations China has been emerging not from a Marxist, but from a feudal state
Adam Smith and Joseph Schumpeter on the Bifurcation of Society
On the issue of the bifurcation of society and the widening income gap in the U.S., and the strains appearing from the factory system in China that have recently been highlighted, there is useful commentary that comes from a surprising quarter, or perhaps not surprising in itself, but in the view taken on the subject: Both Adam Smith and Joseph Schumpeter, defenders of capitalism as the source of “universal opulence”, see a road leading from capitalism to the disenfranchisement of the worker and the vaulting of the elite
John Mauldin: The Matterhorn Interview
Investment advisor John Mauldin explains his attitude towards austerity measures; a return of the gold standard; the euro crisis; and the willingness to bailout everyone that makes capitalism and monetary systems stop working
Class Warfare and Revolution (Circa 1850)
By Rick Bookstaber In a recent post I discuss six policies that spurred the Industrial Revolution in England – opening up immigration, weakening the guilds, investing in infrastructure, privatizing agricultural land, forcing a move to new energy sources, and policies for bringing capital to the new, capital-intensive technologies – and suggest that these policies have
George Soros: “People don’t realize that the system has actually collapsed”
This is an interesting way of looking at it. I have been under the same impression a lot of people are, that the system is teetering on the edge and policy makers are being pushed by markets to save/reform it. But what if what Soros here says is true? What then
What can we learn from the policies that spurred the Industrial Revolution?
Some of the dominant policy issues of today – immigration, energy, the emergence of China – have their analogues in the great Industrial Revolution. The key government policies that laid the foundation for the Industrial Revolution in England include supporting the immigration of skilled workers, allowing for private ownership of farm land, weakening the unions of the day (the guilds), and addressing the energy crisis (in charcoal). And contrary policies in Italy and Spain – countries that were far wealthier and advanced than was per-Industrial Revolution England – derailed a similar revolution from occurring in continental Europe.
England would not have been anyone’s first bet as the cradle of the Industrial Revolution
Crisis and Instability – Searching for Terra Firma
It was not immediately clear to many when the current crisis began that it was going to be this kind of event. The G7 and IMF understand how the cash register works and have vast experience in tweaking the cash register from time to time. What is required now is a new cash register. It will mark as large of a change as Reagan-Thatcher represented at that time. Yet just as it was impossible to anticipate the Reagan-Thatcher cash register when Nixon introduced wage and price controls in 1971, so too is it impossible to anticipate the next cash register now
Workers of the world, good night!
Rick Bookstaber argues that the rise of the super-elite is not a product of educational differences, but rather a result of the new capitalism which creates bigger winners, and does so much more quickly than in the capital-intensive capitalist era. Less capital is needed, it is applied for a shorter period before the results are realized, and because less capital is required, the entrepreneur captures more of the value of the enterprise. The result is an accentuation in the very wealthy
Hoenig: Big banks are fundamentally inconsistent with capitalism
Hoenig, like many Fed leaders from the Reserve banks outside of Washington and the money centers in New York, Boston and San Francisco, is more comfortable with safe and boring banking than the higher risk model that brought the global economy to its knees. This is an important speech criticising the status quo in money, banking and politics from one of America’s most respected regulators. I have embedded a copy of the full piece below
Capitalist Evolution?
By Rick Bookstaber M&A activity is showing signs of life, activity reaching its highest levels since 2007. What more appropriate symbol of the renewal of the economy, of the emerging spring-time of our business cycle, than the merger of two firms, their culture, management style and business as the genes, and the result of the