Support me on Patreon: www.patreon.com/ComradeHakim Twitter: @YaBoiHakim One of my favorite contradictions of Capitalism, here's a quick run-down of the falling rate of profit. Lemme know what you think! *Sources and Further Reading:* Testing Marx: Some new results from UK data, Cockshott The historical transience of capital - The downward trend in the rate of profit since XIX century, Esteban Ezequiel Maito Is There a Tendency for the Rate of Profit to Fall? Econometric Evidence for the U.S. Economy, 1948-2007, Basu Is the Theory of a Falling Profit Rate Valid?, Cockshott gesd.free.fr/lietal.pdf trace.tennessee.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=en.wikipedia.org/&httpsredir=1&article=1293&context=utk_gradthes journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0486613412447059 gesd.free.fr/mrwrate.pdf thenextrecession.files.wordpress.com/2015/12/revisiting-a-world-rate-of-profit-june-2015.pdf thenextrecession.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/uk-rate-of-profit-august-2015.pdf thenextrecession.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/maito-esteban-the-historical-transience-of-capital-the-downward-tren-in-the-rate-of-profit-since-xix-century.pdf ua-cam.com/video/ypJ_tcnfaWA/v-deo.html&ab_channel=PaulCockshott ua-cam.com/video/_BkMiZze4ak/v-deo.html
The falling rate of profit contradiction only holds when goods turn into undifferentiated commodities. But capitalists aren't stupid. That's why they innovate, to keep their products from becoming undifferentiated. Don't believe me? Just look at the Apple iPhone. Believe me, there is NO WAY that Apple will allow the iPhone to become an undifferentiated commodity. And thus they will always work hard to innovate to stay profitable.
@@marcusantimony7535 The falling rate of profit isn't about whether a company sells more or less products, it's about how much it costs companies to make products vs how much money they make selling them. Also, innovation is definitely not the main factor when it comes to a company being successful (one of the main factors is probably marketing), Apple is a prime example of it, just look at their new SE, which is basically a recycled iPhone 8 with the A14 chip
Thank you for the observation,@@euso2008 , yes it is about companies making money: keeping profit margins up by keeping revenues greater than expenses. The point I'm making is that companies will always find new ways to sell - called innovation - they will not let the rate of profit decline over time as a result of technological change. Now whether a particular technology is recycled or not is somewhat irrelevant as long as the company is able to convince folks that something is worth the money. Is a Rolex 500 times better than a Casio? There are plenty of folks that think so.
Your first empirical reference happens to be authored by my macroeconomics professor (Minqi Li). I’ll be sharing this with him, I think he’ll be ecstatic to see his work being shared with the masses!
@@TYsdrawkcaB He appreciated it. he’s been in the public eye before (his wikipedia article is fascinating if you’re curious) so this kinda thing isn’t new to him
He doesn't really dumb anything down, no, but he does simplify it a little for the sake of reaching a bigger audience with quicker, understandable ideas, from what I understand anyway (Spreading the message is a good thing, I'm not criticizing him for this.) Though there's probably an argument to be had as for whether simplifying things a little counts as dumbing something down or not, depending on who you're asking.
@@selearth3123 Yes, but he also links sources to quite serious texts in pinned comments, under all of his videos. So I think he strikes an amazing balance.
@@mcduckington Yes, though I don't think where that balance lies or if he does a good job of hitting it is a particularly interesting conversation. I just wanted to point out that simplifying it in the way he does will reach more people but also lose some in the transition from the video, to the sources and reading material, and that there's probably something to be said about the fact that some will leave with a simplified version of things because of it, compared to having a longer, more in depth video with less reach but where people leave with a better understanding of things, could be argued for as *effectively* dumbing something down a little, even when the extra reading and sources are provided. I'm not gonna argue that point, as I think a wider reach, even at the cost of some deeper understanding, is exclusively a good thing. Just felt like it was worth to add that theres maybe a discussion to be had somewhere in there, hope that makes sense.
That’s the beauty of Marxism as a theory: while it has a technical language, it can be translated to more common talk with relatively little loss of content (and you can use that common talk to teach the more technical language). In that sense it’s the perfect theory of both the proletariat _and_ it’s vanguard!
@@martinreid2352 Unfortunately, the language of Marxism is often unhelpful. Referring to an employee as a 'worker' but an employer as a 'Capitalist' denies the often-occurring situation of the employer being a worker, too.
@@theamorphousflatsch2699 actually a corona mass projection or emp would quite literally end modern society even moreso if everything is made by robots.
I think the hardest thing to understand is rate of profit vs. amount. We always hear about the record amount of profits that capitalists are enjoying, not how much smaller the rate is over previous generations.
@@joshuamarx8209 yes, I guess you're right. But now you've got me thinking: I know what propaganda is, but I don't know the origin of the word. I got some googling to do.
@@snigwithasword1284 inflation is result of fractional reserve banking - tldr banks can emit money from thin air indefinitely. And that wasnt made so lizards can enslave humanity. It main point was to introduce cheap capital - in a full reserver banking you would never get a loan with EAR of like 5% a year. All you would get is 20% or more from a loan shark, or most likely no loan at all. Then demand and supply starts playing role - as more money exists its worth less.
@@marekg7259 It seems like the need for fractional reserve banking is tied to capitalisms failure to recirculate cash accumulated via profit. This ultimately leads to falling prices which prevents economic growth. Upstarts require loans (backed by asset value). This cash has to be added to compensate for hoarding of cash under something like a gold standard. Then later central banks had to be added because bank runs were so destabilizing. This creates the possibility of runaway inflation because a central bank will never have enough gold reserve to cover everyone's savings in a crisis. They have to start floating the currency sooner or later or they run into another crisis. This is why its so annoying arguing with "end the fed" idiots. They don't understand that central banks were invented to solve a crisis. Now central banks are gamed by capitalists to inflate asset prices, sure, but going back to a gold standard just creates an even worse problem. There is no solution because the system is just inherently fucked in the long run.
Thanks Hakim you really got me to stand firm in my Marxist ideals. Before this I was a Soc Dem who couldn’t commit to this ideology. Because of years of going to private school and getting Capitalist ideals drilled into my head. You have helped a lot. Thanks! You’ve really grown the movement.
I like to think of it as similar to the Second Law of Thermodynamics; that is, the net entropy of a system will always increase. It's the same reason that perpetual motion machines are impossible; you either need to bring in some source of fuel or energy from outside, or keep cycling the same energy without losing any -- and there are *always* losses, to things like friction, waste heat, etc. Any given capitalist system always needs to be bringing in some sort of "fuel" from outside -- the whole "infinite growth on a finite planet" thing -- to sustain itself. You can imagine this on a smaller scale: a single capitalist company, corporation, organization, etc. *cannot* sustain itself with only its own employees as a customer base. It cannot pay its employees the full value of the work they are doing if it wants to make a profit (and the greater capitalist system means it *must* make a profit), therefore when they turn around and pay their wages back to the company as its customers, they won't be able to bring in enough revenue to pay the employees again and repeat the cycle. The amount of value that is being extracted from the workers is akin to the loss of energy in the perpetual motion machine: if there is any value extracted the system will slowly wind down, and there *must* be value extracted for the capitalist enterprise to survive. Now scale this up to the whole planet. Capitalism has colonized the whole world; there are no more sources of untapped, external wealth it can rely upon to fuel itself. It can now only cycle the same amount of wealth around endlessly, and the act of making a profit is continuously concentrating that wealth into fewer and fewer hands. As the wealth becomes concentrated, there is less and less for the wealthy to extract from the rest of the populace. Left to run long enough this will result in one omni-wealthy person owning everything and the rest of humanity impoverished, there will be no reason for the owner to provide anyone a job or sell them anything, because the owner already owns everything -- any transaction is net loss. In practice, though, the system will rip itself apart long before it gets to that end state.
based just on how absurd the system always has been, and how people seem to take the increasing absurdity, if not in stride, seem to be adapting to it, i'm not so sure capitalism will do so. i think that we can observe that wealth inequality seems to be worse than at any other point of history, surpassing everything besides mansa munsa, and yet rebellion seems to be set in controlled ways, such as jan. 6th. that's not to say the successful cooptation of BLM in certain locations and with certain people. it's suprisingly durable, yet frail, just like a zombie. everyone know's it just a matter of time, but whenever you listen to even the most intelligent and informed, even they well tell you they have no clue when. i think it's more likely than some people would like to think, that this system will get even worse, and won't die within our lifetime. I'm not being pessimistic here, in fact quite the opposite. i think that we need to be assured that we need to act in order for it to topple, and that our action isn't an inevitability. it's demise isn't going to happen on its own, that it's not going to rip itself apart, we are the ones who are going to break relations, rather than relations being broken with or without us.
"Capitalism has colonized the whole world; there are no more sources of untapped, external wealth it can rely upon to fuel itself" Maybe that's the reason behind the constant attempts to speculate on imaginary things ... NFTs, Cryptos, mortgage-backed securities etc. The trend is likely to pick up a lot in the coming years
@@anmolt3840051 That's actually something I have thought of for a long time. If the theory of labour value still work within capitalists system, and it still is, then what is the point of the service economy which people praised it to be the most advanced stage of the economy? You are practically a glorified warehouse, slapping price tags on things just to increase it's price without actually increase it's value? And what will happen when people eventually realized that the price of things have been inflated too much it's no longer getting anywhere close to it's real value? They will stop buying it and the pyramid scheme will collapse.
When it happens is up to us. Educate and organise, comrade. Do what you can each day to bring about the international proletariat revolution, and we'll overthrow the capitalist pigs together.
@L When the sun in our solar system explodes and the universe disappears marxism will still the most retarded economical political ideology ever created . No amount of evolution will change that
pretty sure the Amish told everyone first, and unlike Marx came to a more sustainable and ethical solution, which I realize is damning with faint praise.
Whats funny about this, is that I was taught this same thing, but from a different angle in an MBA course. So on the one hand, Capitalist defenders will argue against such things, but on the other hand, Capitalists know full well it's the reality. They just spin it from being a flaw in the system to a game of trying to maximize your profit by finding where your "marginal profit" is 0. For you see, once you start producing beyond where your marginal profit is 0 and becomes negative, you are now making less profit with each additional unit you produce. And thats bad for business, so don't do that. No, don't think about the further implications that has for society, especially in industries which are monopolistic in nature.
"Kapitalism sucks. It's time to go beyond." There it is, folks. It really is that simple. Likely sooner than later, Kapitalism is going to be dust-binned like every other political economy which preceded it. I find I take more and more pleasure watching the futile thrashings of the defenders of Kapitalism as the rotted system they champion (ironically, amongst many in the propagandized working class -- don't worry, we're gonna help you see the light) slips into accelerating decay. The future is Red.
Ojalá el sistema capitalista se caiga. (Not literal translation: May capitalism crash and burn) Fun unrelated fact: Ojalá comes from the word inshallah.
Ojalá que no, de momento vamos ganando. A ver cuando los comunistas hacéis algo que se pueda caer y no venga ya caido de serie, la verdad es que el capitalismo ha probado ser superior en todo aspecto, por eso es la fuerza hegemónica y el comunismo se cayó si es que alguna vez ha estado de pie.
It's nice to know that capitalism is bound to end one day. The bad thing is that there's a good chance that when it goes, it's going to take us all with it. Also, I think that the title is a bit misleading - yeah, the falling rate of profit dooms capitalism to stagnation of basically all aspects of civilization, but it doesn't mean that capitalism will just disappear automatically when it hits the threshold - even if RoP is microscopic, there's still a way for the bourgeoisie to keep the system afloat by increasing exploitation and inequality even further, and keeping the plebs busy with BS jobs that have no real value.
It's great but I don't see a revolution in America in our life time. Anticommunist rhetoric has been ingrained in their heads for so long its practically a religion- All good in the world is capitalism; all bad in the world is communism. All good in the world is God; all bad in the world is the devil. Class consciousness will never be reached in the country, sadly. However, America's economy is gonna collapse anytime soon so at least the rest of the world can have a revolution
@@TheQueen-sw4th I dunno, maybe it's in the eye of the beholder. I'm a Russian dude from a former Soviet country, and I think that we have even less chances than you guys :D Sure, the word "communism" in the US media is a scarecrow that lost its meaning and gets thrown around as an insult, but if/when the US economy goes south and there's a problem with basic needs like food and water, you guys will have a lot of angry people, many of them armed. Still, I think that the next generation has a much better chance to see a revolution than we do, regardless of the country. But there's definitely a rising tangible demand for social justice in the air everywhere even now, which gives some hope for a better future, if not for us then at least for our kids. No pasaran, comrades :)
@Ablaze Eclipse the bourgeoisie isn't a conscious being with rational thought, it's a social class and it is definitely on track to destroy humanity. Just look at global warming or the ecological disaster that is in the works. We are screwed unless we eliminate the bourgeoisie as fast as possible
@@TheQueen-sw4th I live in Latvia. Don't be surprised about ex-USSR countries not being the vanguard of socialist ideas nowadays: shortly before the collapse of the USSR, during Gorbachev's Perestroika/Glasnost ("Reboot/Publicity"), massive anti-soviet, anti-communist and nationalist propaganda began everywhere, and continues to this day. In smaller countries, like mine, the main vector of propaganda was chauvinistic nationalism - "you red russki scum were oppressing us for decades, but now we are free". In Russia it was that too ("We had to feed a bunch of useless freeloaders from other Soviet republics for decades, but now we are free"), but mostly their anti-communist propaganda was/is about "freedoms" - how the USSR was a totalitarian prison with "mass murders of innocents by the government", "no free speech", "no political opposition" and "pathetic living standards" (the latter is "explained" by the lack of commodities like jeans or expensive cars). Also, long before the collapse, the Soviet education system basically stopped being serious about thoroughly explaining even the basics of socialism to everyone. For example, most of the generation of my parents, who grew up in the sixties-seventies, doesn't know a darn thing about marxism, unless they had a university degree specifically in communist theory. Probably that was because the Soviet ruling bureaucrats stopped trying to build communism after Stalin's death and slowly began restoring capitalism, since most of the executive power belonged to them (bureaucrats), and not to the people (the Soviets/Councils). The gradual degradation and collapse of the USSR is a big topic, we can only scratch the surface in a single message, but the point is that it wasn't an explosive process, and rather a gradual one, spanning several decades, and the main root cause was probably the slow creep of power from democracy (Soviets) to the bureaucracy from the high ranks of the CPSU.
Micheal Roberts book, "World in Crisis: A Global Analysis of Marx's Law of Profitability" is an excellent collection of research papers summarized by him. It explores different countries and their specific issues they have. It also has a long list of references at the end of each chapter if you want to delve deeper into it. I highly recommend it.
Great video. I highly recommend Michael Roberts' blog in regards to this topic, he is a Marxist economist thats been covering this topic for up to a decade on there now and show a lot of evidence for how the rate of profit has fallen globally : "A world rate of profit: important new evidence " for the post on this.
Right now a game of musical chairs has started. We will be seeing movement of capital on an unprecedented scale. (in our adult lives) from stocks to bond funds. Demand destruction is everywhere. How can gasoline be so high when millions of remote workers have yet to return to work? The answer is taxes. Municipalities are hurting from lack of revenues; They have to issue debt in the form of bonds and service the bonds dividend/coupon payments. With no natural demand inflation is the only means these funds can be raised. Taxes are a vehicle by which investers, bureaucrats and politicians can avoid labor. One would have hoped all this capital would have put upward pressure on wages but not nearly enough. Unskilled labor commands 15$/hr these days. Eventually wage increases will come but not before the redistribution of capital has taken place into bonds.
@@alexwilkinson4896 Let's say you start a business which undercuts all your competitors. Their profits fall, and you make them as a result of them losing profits.
Great video as always. But I would add that capitalism may well transition back into feudalism due to the falling RoP, what is sometimes called rentier capitalism. Looking forward to a video on "unequal exchange" since to me the notion implies value is created in distribution, a contradiction of vol 2 of Capital. edit: by which I mean it is the exploitation that is unequal, not the exchange, since the latter is subject to arbitrage.
This is what I've been thinking too. Yanis Varoufakis mentioned that the post-capitalistic society might be techno-feudalism. There's a video where he discusses with Slavoj Zizek in case you haven't seen it.
Boss makes a dollar, I make a dime. Thats why I listen to comrade hakims socialist propaganda on company time. Thansk comrade, you make the world a better place by educating one pleb at a time lol
Hey comrade, I love your content, but I find it hard to agree with your point made regarding automation (4:24-4:30). In the short run this can impact consumers disposable income, but in the long run technological advancement (including automation) tends to increase the standard of living (see the Solow-Swan growth model, in case you’re not familiar with it). Sometimes automation can also increase the marginal product of labour (MPL) which then increases the demand of labour. Again, I am a HUGE fan of your videos, but I was reluctant to agree with that sentiment. Thanks!
You're in dire need of an introductory economics course. Ive already told you this so many times over but you're a slow learner. i really dont know where to begin because you understand economics like a flat earther understands physics. your marxian math couldnt even qualify for highschool mathematical economics. you said profit rate is surplus/capital investment. if you use this basic production function derivation y=[aP/w]^1/a-1 y is quantity output and the otherside is price output. you'll come up with a supply function. but supply function alone doesnt determine surplus/profit because supply is exogenous to demand. you cant supply more than what is demanded,hence more labor doesnt always mean more surplus. take water with very high utility and supply for instance. if marx was right that labor is value then water should be very expensive due to an over abundance of labor supplied for it. but the opposite is true. water is very cheap not merely because there's an abundance of supply for it. but rather because water is very easy to harvest hence there's ample of labor supply for it making it very cheap. the same case applies for monopoly and perfect market pricing. both have very different production and employment elasticities but nonetheless can sell products at very similar prices yet different quantities. perfect markets where cost is almost profit and monopolies with inelastic employment yet can sell cheaper products is a decisive proof that Labor only chases value(profit) and not yhe other way around. we put labor on STUFF WE VALUE. we don't value STUFF because there's labor exhausted on it.
"you cant supply more than what is demanded" My dude they're literally digging holes in the earth to throw excess goods into because supply is so high They're LITERALLY coating Peru in unsold clothes because supply is too high "take water with very high utility and supply for instance. if marx was right that labor is value then water should be very expensive due to an over abundance of labor supplied for it" You're not making sense. Water is cheap because it literally falls from the sky. It's cheap because there's very little that needs to be done to make it a product!
@@proximaism The labour cost of treating, bottling and distributing water is relatively low, that's why it usually has a low price. Again, for labour to produce value it has to be expended on something useful. Say there's something with a very niche use value that requires a lot of labour to produce, it will still have a high value, it will still be expensive. Like that civet poop coffee, it has very niche use value, not much demand at all, but since it has such a large labour cost it's extremely expensive.
crazy how almost every single sucessfull country is capitalist (USA, almost all europe, canada, england, rusia, etc.), crazy how china only started to become a potency when it started to introduce capitalism into his economy, crazy how almost every single communist country has failed over and over again every single it tried to be implemented acroos different times, places, cultures and moments of history. crazy how most socialist today come from sucesfull capitalist countries, crazy how most of say socialist are midlle class or upper class, almost like socialist its always wore by those that never taste it.
"crazy how almost every single sucessfull country is capitalist (USA, almost all europe, canada, england, rusia, etc." I mean...all the poorest countries are also capitalist. What's your point? Why doesn't capitalism work for the parts of the world that didn't lead globe-spanning empires? " crazy how almost every single communist country has failed over and over again every single it tried to be implemented acroos different times, places, cultures and moments of history" Wow I wonder if the slaughter of millions of people in those countries by US-backed armies had anything to do with their problems Nah probably just coincidence lol "crazy how most socialist today come from sucesfull capitalist countries" Prove this. " crazy how most of say socialist are midlle class or upper class" ahahaha Show me these upper class socialists, I'm dying to see this
@@DeoMachina 1. to answer your question: semi-socialism or socialist policies, just look at LATAM, argentina, venenzuela, mexico, soon chile, all of these countries where okay until they became slighty socialist. 2. ¨the american block did it¨ its the excuse of socialism for every single failure of the socialist system, cuba, china, urss, amlo in mexico, venenzuela, etc. and you know what? even if that was true and USA was powerfull enough to tear down so many countries, that would only prove that capitalism is better than socialism since a capatitalist country managed to take down at least 10 socialist countries. 3. dude, its in google, a lot of civils in USA, canada, europe, etc. are socialist, just look at the numbers of the democrat party 4. okay, here you go: a) www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2021-09-14/met-gala-2021-aoc-tax-the-rich-dress (rich woman) b) knowyourmeme.com/photos/2115227-political-compass (the famous ok boomer girl) look, we can debate for hours, but at the end of the day is simple: capitalism built walls to keep people outside, socialism build walls to keep people inside, theres no ground for a even match.
Totally random question but what do Turkish leftists think about Atatürk? I don't know anything about his economic policies but as an American, the idea of state enforced secularism/positivism sounds good.
@@jeffersonclippership2588 note: not Turkish, but I am interested on the country for family reasons. While many thinks Atatürk did are probably good, I do think it is good to also acknowledge that he was very nationalist. This insistence that Turkey must be "Turkish" seems to have led to the mistreatment of Kurds up to this day.
@@jeffersonclippership2588 without a doubt that he was one of the most important figures in fighting against imperialism. his endeavors during and after the turkish liberation war gave us courage and reliance in choosing our own fate through rapid westernization and industrialization. in the early phase of turkish republic, there had been dozens of state-owned factories built and the efforts of self-sufficient turkey is somehow achieved. nevertheless, the growth and the surplus had not been embodied with the working class but rather turkish economy created its own turkish bourgeoise via several ways of accumulating wealth on the hands of a few entrepreneurs. we could have been a country like south korea or japan however historical process paved a completely different path for us. even though ataturk was not a leftist leader, his name will always be revered by turkish society and post-colonial nations as an emulating figure for fighting against imperialism.
"Capitalism has failed, fails and will fail in each one of the societies where it puts its tentacles that are based on the expropriation and exploitation of man by man. That's what we fight!" - CARVALHO, João
When you look at the countries of the world which a) have the highest living-standards in the world for the ordinary people and b) have the highest living-standards that people have ever had in history, don't you think that the assertion "capitalism has failed" is untrue?
@@lochnessmunster1189 no, because these living-standards depends of the poverty on the third world. The wealth of rich countries come from colonialism, genocide, racism and the bombing of poor countries.
@@rsouzaneres No, it doesn't. Can you name me any of the world's poorest countries which are poorer now than they were 100 years ago? How can bombing a poorer country, thus having to use wealth on weaponry, and making the other country poorer, make a richer country richer?
New Hakim video dropped! I love what you do, my friend. You helped me to radicalize further. And I know you want me to read more and not rely on UA-cam and podcasts, which I very much plan to. Still, your work has had such an impact on me. Thank you so much for what you do!
I absolutely adore the fact you provide sources for your videos and future reading. I always watch a documentary before reading a book, some people prefer to read only the books but me being a history junkie I like to see it as, the more the merrier.
.. And that profit motive has also made thousands of innovations that changed mankind. Also, you can't make profit without serving the interests of the consumer.
@@hazyorange No one denies capitalism has brought benefits to humanity. It is a step up from feudalism, which is a step up from slavery. But capitalism is not eternal. No economic system is. Just as capitalism replaced feudalism, socialism is the inevitable successor of capitalism. Also regarding consumers, there indeed are products that people want, but have you also considered the reason why advertising is so in-your-face? To tell you to buy something, regardless if you need it or not. Consumerism and artificial demand are real things.
@@Astrobaut And yet everyone who has tried it eventually failed. Because of the lack of incentive to work(high wages), unpredictable planning(planned economies), and the persecution of success(killing the businessowners and landlords).
@Devil's Logic 1. No... no more... 2. True, but we can't make everyone incentivized to do hard work for their society, if they can't recieve consequences from not doing it, like getting fired for being lazy. 3. I don't know much about AI planned economy's, but I'll let that pass. 4. Business is not exploitation. You gain profit from providing a consumer for their needs, and if they don't, then according to the free market they will not.
@@hazyorange A Landlord isn´t doing any productive labour, the state/community can be a landlord as well, basically, all you need to do to be a landlord, is owning land and maybe hiring a janitor. Workers associations can easily do that as well. The reasons, why socialist countries failed are complex, very complex, a bunch of different factors played a role, like oil prices, inefficient planning (that means, planning was done in an inefficient way, not that planning is generally inefficient), a lack of information, to much focus on heavy industry and the military-industrial sector, a certain amount of ignorance for structural problems which started to occur since the 60s, as already mentioned an unhealthy dose of outside interference, a hierarchy that was a little to static at some times, incompetence of some high ranking personell, and so on and so forth. None of these problems is the sole main reason why these countries failed, none of these problems would´ve been unfixable and none of them are inherent to socialism. That means, we can (and have) learned from them and make it better next time. We´ll often hear the sentence "socialism has failed countless times, history as proven this and that", all of this is bullshit. History can´t prove anything, because it´s not a natural science or math, it´ll never repeat itself. And Socialism hasn´t failed countless times, it has failed a few times, like every new ideology did the first few times it was tried. That´s normal and no proof of anything. Nobody get´s it perfect the first few times. Of course we are just humans and thus we´ll never be able to create a perfect functioning system, and eventually, everything, that we as humanity do, will probably fail. The thing is, we defintely know, that this will be the case with capitalism, and we have the choice, to replace it with a better system as soon as we can, or cling to and go down with it
There is quite a few downsides to universal healthcare. For instance, my Grandmother was given a drug which made her blind. They did this because the drug which had no risk of making you blind cost slightly more. She would have happily paid for it out of her own pocket, but Canadian healthcare laws don't let you have that option. Another issue is your health problems cost everyone. Smoke? Overweight? Poor immune system? You're a drain on society. Perhaps these dead weights shouldn't be given priority healthcare. We can't help everyone after all. Then you have the government regulating how you live your life. Mandatory exercise. No medical aid if you have don't have your shots. No drinking. No smoking. No drugs or we won't help you. If shots are mandatory, well, why not start testing theories? For the greater good of course. Like the Tuskegee Study (Black people given fake treatment for AIDS). Or operation SeaSpray(San Francisco purposefully bio-attacked by government). But this time it's easy to get away with. They're mandatory, you can't even be cautious if you want to. What Americans need is a better system. They spend so much on healthcare per person it is ridiculous.
@@JV-uo7zz i am amazed how you leftists manage to do such terrible scarecrows falacies. Like you must be totally tard in order to think that he meant that, which i am totally sure that you are, the true problem of humanity it is ppl like you that fail to think logically, that brings inefficacy and inefficiency thus poverty and recession, how many Berlin walls need to fall in order you to open your eyes.
I always heard "communism doesnt work" growing up. I'm not sure what form my ideal communist society would take, but it sure as hell seems like capitalism doesnt really "work" either.
I never even heard that, it was always just dismissive attitudes towards any socialist ideas at all. I was discussing communism with my dad, and I asked him what he thought communism meant. He said, "It's when a country is led by a dictator, and strips the rights of citizens by forcing them to work." He doesn't believe in capitalism, in fact he hates most capitalist ideas. He was just brainwashed since he was a kid to believe that communism = authoritarianism. He's a socialist now since I've educated him.
@@justsomeguy6336 Poor people are poor for a variety of reasons, namely being born into poverty, poverty causing stress, stress lowering decision making skills, and bad financial decisions being made. I wouldn't expect a believer of capitalism to admit that, though.
"capitalism failled, fails and will fail in each of the societies embraced by its tentacles which are based on the exploration and expropriation of men by itself" ~Carvalho João
Most Communist movements: *scream as they get stomped out by Capitalists post-Soviet collapse* Capitalism: Fine, I'll do it myself *hits self destruct button*
the title imply it's communism is somehow different, here's a PSA: **no system is impervious to failure.** there's one constant with civilisations through history, it's that systems will *inevitably fail* because of their respectives short-comings. if you're debating "[insert system] good/bad", then you already missed the fucking point.
@@KyriosHeptagrammaton yeah, that's right systems aren't meant to be a constant, they're meant to strive, and then be switched with the most appropriate one once it started declining.
So basically eventually there will be no incentive to invest for the capitalists because the amount of profit gained form improving production methods will be too low to justify investment risk?
This argument relies on a few weird assumptions. One, that life is a zero sum game. If you automate a job there will be no other jobs. This is not true. Computers in the middle-ages wouldn't be able to find employment in the modern age, but they could get a job as a programmer or mathematician. Farmers can get jobs as artisans now that farming is done by a tiny % of the population rather than everyone. Second, as pointed out in the first paper you cite "The fall of the profit rate and profit share reflected rising wage and taxation costs. " Sounds like a good thing to me. If you have a bunch of serfs, of course you'll have more profit than if you have high paid employees and social programs. Third if capitalist start losing money because of cruelty to workers they'll be less cruel. "The profit focused people not caring about profit" is not ironic, it's an incredible short sighted and facile criticism of the system. The reason we have 8 hour work days now was because Ford lowered it to increase profit. That's the whole point of capitalism. It's self-correcting. Marx was great a pointing out problems, but an incredible narrow focused, short sighted, greedy wastrel whose solutions were worse than useless. He spent far more money than most people of his time, more than his family could afford. If Marx himself can't keep to his share, the system was doom from the start.
"Farmers can get jobs as artisans" Bro even artists can't get jobs as artisans come on "Third if capitalist start losing money because of cruelty to workers they'll be less cruel" Oh yeah the historical record is full of examples of this. Mm, totally. Definitely no tendency for capitalists to double down and support extremist political factions that suppress workers when things are tough. Nope. Never happened across the world or anything. "That's the whole point of capitalism. It's self-correcting." Let me know when it lasts for more than 20 years without crashing and we'll talk about self-correction. "If Marx himself can't keep to his share, the system was doom from the start." This isn't remotely logical. Marx was wrong because of how he lived his life? What next? Einsteins theory of relativity is wrong because he married his relative? This is playground shit, man. Marx simply described the economic system he lived in. His claims are all verifiable and easily proven.
hey dy=umbie right wingers bpurguise automation is to make system efficient yes it replace jobs but very few in those place cause massive unemployment aka job loss
I like the insinuation that automation of say, a hundred warehouse jobs would be filled by a sudden demand for a hundred programmers and maintenance workers to maintain the 6 robots that were installed to replace them. You reactionaries need to get some better arguments
@@Gangst3r4ever Uh...Have you heard of the great depression? Greatest economic crisis ever and it was government that slowly made the situation better.
@@legrandliseurtri7495 That's a myth. Look into it more. It was the war that changed things. Anyway you keep believing in your higher corrupt power. Hell you can even pray to it for all I care. But remember all the stuff that went on with Covid because of governments.
Feudalism has existed for centuries. However, that does not mean that it's a good economic system. The same can be said for capitalism. Secondly, the Chinese Communist Party has definitely been in power for more than 40 years. Finally, socialism (in China) has done more than just function. It's propelled a previously backward, agrarian society that regularly experienced famine into the position of being a global superpower.
Of course profits tend to 0. That means maximum efficiency was reached. This allows innovation in other sectors since economic subjects tend to search profit, new markets will be created and so new opportunities for profit. The fact that profits tend to go towards 0 means also that resources get used in the most optimal way, which is essential for a species to survive and evolve (You can find something similar in evolutionary biology). In essence capitalism is just the optimal way to use resources in a world where resources a limited.
I believe your understanding of evolutionary biology in this context isn’t correct. Biologically speaking, the pressures that the environment places on the organisms in it (and that they place on each other, since organisms are a part of their environment) do not “push” organisms to optimize their reproductive strategies. Instead, the strategies that fail don’t get passed on. It’s not really careful consideration of resource use, it’s random selection filtered through the present environmental pressures. The amount of “waste” (in this metaphor, the number of individuals who die before reproducing) is astronomical. It can hardly be considered an optimal process that produces an optimal output. Evolution seeks “good enough” not “as good as it can be”. In many cases, successful strategies aren’t exactly what we would call “efficient” in the resource use or optimized output meaning of the term. You could theoretically design a more well-suited, more efficient organism for a given system (or introduce one in the case of some invasive species), but only in terms of its ability to reproduce. At the end of the day that’s all that’s being “optimized” for and even then the bar for “optimization” is being moved constantly because of the shifting nature of the environment. The scare quotes here are intentional. The drive for efficiency in resource use or in production isn’t a thing nature as a whole pressures for. That’s a human drive. One we might have gotten from evolutionary processes and has given us a rather large leg up on other animals, but that doesn’t mean this is what evolutionary processes tend towards. At the end of the day, I’d not press the incredibly random nature of evolution into the box of an optimizing process. That’s personifying evolutionary processes, it’s not how they work.
@@elizabethhicks4181 I meant at a micro scale and not makro. At a micro scale they do strive for resource optimization. That said I'm no biology expert
@@Gigachad-mc5qz The concept of destroying everything for money is just wrong. Are we extracting resources? Yes. Would any other type of civilisation extract the same resources? Yes. Is a free market capitalistic model with profit incentives the most optimal way to USE those resources? Yes. Any type of organisation would use the same amount of resources, the profit incentive is just here to use these resources better. Of course you can argue that the profit incentive tends to push the use of these resources to the limit, but you have to understand that this way the most amount of people will benefit from them.
@@borde02 how will people benefit if we are destroying the only planet in the entire fucking universe we know of that supports conplex life. You see that as profit? I dont
Wouldn't an easier TLDR summary be: as industry automates more and more the only way to stay competitive is to keep dropping prices, leading to the point that each unit sold is only marked up by pennies. But also since you've laid all your workforce off they can't afford your products even at that low mark up?
I havent seen much product dropping in price, they usually increase, unless they are rare product that havent been manifactured in large quantity, they drop a bit after. whats up with that?
@@MilouPaint As the economy tends towards monopoly, the smaller and smaller number of firms controlling the market start seeing their profits fall. There's a couple ways to combat this, and if you're share of the market is big enough, one way you can do this is to increase prices. Since you hold such a large share of the market you can muscle out competition that tries to under sell you and consumers won't be able to acquire your products from any other firm, meaning the goods you sell will become increasing inelastic. Your rate of profit will continue to fall despite this though, it's just a means to slow the process.
the workforce is what makes profit necessary. as the workforce becomes more obsolete, so does profit. we're witnessing this in real time, profit is already serving diminishing utility for the ruling class. to their credit communists unlike capitalists at least foresaw this, but they're still utterly delusional about the outcome. the post-profit, technocratic world will not be a utopia, quite the opposite. profit has been the only regulating force tethering materialism to the consequences of its ungodly inhumanity. with that gone, you will live to see manmade horrors beyond your comprehension.
This is sort of why I'm gradually coming around to the Varoufakis view. I'm not so sure that capitalism is the system we're living under anymore. It seems that capitalism―left to run rampant via the failures of the left on one side and the stubborn nature of elites on the other―has evolved into something even more rapacious. Techo-feudalism is the age we are living in and it is terrifying.
@@surgeland9084 I mean, technically it was the 90s, but if you’re in a developed country, and even if you aren’t, we’re living with the best living standards in history. Society as a whole is garbage at functioning, and that’s shown across history
@@kenos911 it's indeed terrifying that people still believe in demonstrably false delusions like "that you're living in the best times in history", as if climate change / global warming, covid pandemic, global food crisis, coming economic recession, etc just doesn't exist ua-cam.com/video/fo2gwS4VpHc/v-deo.html ua-cam.com/video/Co4FES0ehyI/v-deo.html ua-cam.com/video/-S-CwVJxxug/v-deo.html
I can't speak for anyone else, but if it wasn't for some rich man giving me a job and paying me less than I'm worth, and me working hard at two different jobs at one time I wouldn't be nearly out of debt now. I do great. It is too bad you don't. I own my own property and it don't bother me that there are rich people at all. Every success story using capitalism is always gonna be a black eye for socialism. So I don't need some guy who lived off his woman telling me how capitalism is gonna implode on itself and how socialism will save the race. I put God first and work hard, and I am successful, even if I'm not a millionaire. You just can't argue with success. Enjoy the theory.
Why do you think that he (hakim) is complaining about this kind of system which causes imperialism as an economical system to exploit the resources, labor and markets of 3rd world nations? Maybe it is because the 1st world imperialist countries systematically destroyed Iraq (his native country) to exploit the resources (oil) and to implement a neoliberal puppet state? And if you don't know he has a job as a doctor if I remember correctly so insulting him like this is a bit stupid.
And what exactly does your "success story" change anything about the systemical poverty and imperialism? Maybe someone wants to become a teacher and can't afford it to study because of his student debt.
You are stuck on catch words. In reality, I was out of work and sleeping in a storage unit, with 4 dollars. I know all about poverty sir. It is no excuse to not succeed. I never got welfare. I got a job. Today, I have property and a home that is paid for. I am just about out of debt. I owe a little bit on my car. I put God first and didn't play the victim. A smart student finds a way to get want they want without begging the government for a handout.
@@Nietzsche2329 it sounds like it really bothers you that God enabled me to succeed without complaining about the government. Else you wouldn't bother trying to compete with words. The other countries have their leadership. try to start blaming them for their mismanagement if your are intent on assigning blame. Each country is its own family. You don't respect your own parents, your enemies won't either and you are stuck with being humiliated. You just try to go to Russia and burn🔥 their flag down and see what happens to you. You will be put to death for disrespectful behavior. Other countries don't tolerate things the way the USA does. I also read about visiting Thailand. You don't wanna go there without reading the dos and don't. You will be in jail, if you violate their rules, no its ands or buts.
@@YourCapyFrenBigly_3DPipes1999 after the civil war, Lebanon's infrastructure was almost entirely destroyed after years of indiscriminate bombing campaigns by Israel. The state had become too fractured and weakened to do anything about it and a wealthy capitalist tycoon named Rafik Hariri personally stepped in to renovate most of the country. He appropriated much of our public facilities and properties often through ruthless and unscrupulous means and things like public transport, sanitation, etc. were privatized and many lower-middle class neighbourhoods once teaming with life and economic activity were replaced with luxury shops and skyscrapers that no one could afford and were mostly used as a front for money laundering. Rent as a result skyrocketed and many people were left unable to live in their own cities anymore and impoverished. Not to mention the horrendous banking policy that was implemented that turned the country from a relatively self-sufficient economy with diversified modes of production into a shitty tax haven style economy which produces very little and became reliant on begging for scraps by the IMF.
Great explanation! One concern I've had about this is the, let's say, countervailing tendency to perpetual warfare that is especially worrying. We don't have a definitive picture of just how sustainably capitalism can build, destroy, and rebuild to destroy again (short, probably, of the ultimate environmental catastrophe we're accelerating toward). It's important to emphasize that, in-built self-destruct though it is, there's nothing mechanistic or fatalistic about this tendency. We can't just wait for the rate of profit to spontaneously collapse and then build socialism. We may not have that long.
I thought that simply competition made businesses want to lower total price and with that also the rate of profit, thus making rate of profit tend to decrease (when not in a monopoly), pretty simple if I say so myself. The idea is that when the rate of profit becomes 0 in an industry, all the businesses in that industry will begin losing money and the amount of money/capital will decide how long the businesses will last. Then at some point there will be only one business, which due to lack of competition can create a monopoly and skyrocket prices and thus the rate of profit too, while destroying competition through a more qualitative product and a more efficient production line. IN theory, this should make people want to revolt, to change system to a more sustainable, socialism, but due to lack of inflation of prices and due to the prolonging of this (competitive) capitalist stage, due to a stable increase in technology or increase in the economy (globalization/neo-imperialism), the people of said capitalist countries didn't want to change their ways. Because why be a communist when business is booming. However, things are changing. Technology is not improving as fast as it used to, and the economy can't expand. Due to this, the economy WILL make businesses fail and thus monopolize and create a mayor drop in standards of living. This will in turn completely screw the proletariat and make them angry and revolt. Besides, the historically economically powerful economies of Europe and NA are beginning to lose their powerful positions and giving it to countries like China, Brazil, Russia and India. This will make the neo-imperialist relations reverse and make us the Second World and the new powerhouses the First World. Which is very worrying for the nations which use countries like China to make all their products and have lost much of their old industry for that reason. Some economies will just cease because of this, making the standards of living plummet and making the proletariat angry once again. This will cause a change in political ideology due to so many people being mad. But let's hope it will also be a communist one instead of a fascist/feudal one, which is kinda likely due to the amount of rightists versus leftists one Europe and NA. I expect a new industrial revolution in Europe and NA too, which will return the industrial sector of Europe and NA to Europe and NA instead of the nations of the nowadays Periphery and Semi-periphery.
@@lochnessmunster1189 because there is no excuse for bad stuff. Without profit incentives the most important thing is survival and survival of future people and that is a very noble cause; way more important than short term consumption.
@@fakedoorsfordinner1677 Okay, but how would a Socialist model, which uses the same materials to product the same goods in the exact-same way, be less environmentally-destructive? And how do you eliminate profit incentives?
@@lochnessmunster1189 If you are getting what you need and are not possible to gain more than you need, than you stop working to better your boss, and start working on other things like: to better yourself, your community and your future and other possible life improvements. Work will be directly beneficiary to the people doing it, instead of the indirect "here is some conpensation" type. This means more overall freedom and less alienation away from your community, friends and family. People will be their community and their community will be their friends. That's how it ought to be, imo (in my oppinion).
Correction: when the organic composition of capital and the decline in the rate of surplus value indicates not an absolute fall in the cost of labour power but a *relative* fall (i.e. a larger portion of the value in the outlay is from the means of production). If labour costs 1 unit of value, and machinery 1, then later labour costs the same amount and machinery 2, the organic composition of capital has risen relative to labour power, but the absolute quantity of labour power is constant. Since machinery does not produce value, the value of final goods is therefore closer to the value of the outlay and the rate of surplus value can therefore fall, which causes an aggregate decline in the rate of profit, since prices only distribute values.
@@chris135x No, that you projecting you own flaws onto other people. You're full of BS. That's just you resorting to emotional attacks in order to defend your ego. Socialism is the better economic system by a landslide. It's not even a choice at this point. It's go Socialist or go extinct. Pick one.
This theory may be more relevant than ever with the introduction of AI. AI is a "renewable resource" in that it mostly take jobs and not give. The recent layoffs should tell you all about it.
Yep, I really want to be an artist but AI might ruin my future. All those AI companies care about is profit from stealing copyrighted work and taking away jobs.
He never thought to consider that's corporatism totalitarian 1984 jorge jorwel no family all same wage no toothbrush see see pee our ponies sparrows khmer rouge uyghur national socialism molotov ribbentrop castro stole my grandpa's livestock haircut jim jong un made me eat dragonflies look good theory but practice china tibet owner take risk classist much iceland ancap pilgroms socialist no work human nature, hmmm?
"Capitalism is death"- the world's population is higher now than at any point in human history, and the ordinary people are wealthier than ever before.
Finally, a cheerful area to explore... Leave it to Hakim! Thank you, yes, let's get on with this inevitable collapse & on to building a decent future to share!
It would be interesting to see what countries clothes and such were made in. Chinese labor is cheap so they are made there. Then the people want more wages, why can't they just be good slaves, so production moves to India. Then to Burma, then Indonesia, maybe back to Erupoe(sic) next. Coorrelate(sp) that to profit and revenue.
@@chompythebeast That doesn't make any sense. He's saying that socialism and communism is bad because it has been tried many times before and it failed every single time.
What we shouldn't really be afraid of is a robot revolt, but if one never comes to pass after the capitalists create the first batch. If the billionaires, of whatever species, are able to keep their infinitely loyal consumerist robot slaves on a leash, that's it for both humanity and robots.
@@maltheopia But how can robots be "slaves" to an owner? Is a printing-press a "slave" in the same way? And what's the point having consumerist robots?
@@maltheopia OK, but are you talking about robots which have been manufactured by the owners of the production? Also, what exactly do you mean by "exploitation"?
"How come capitalism is still successful" [citation needed] "and every example of socialism and communism never lasts more than a few decades?" [citation needed]
Ask yourself this: How come kings ruled the world for so many centuries, if American democracy is so great? The answer is state murder, called law. Feudalism was replaced. Capitalism, too, will be replaced. Their having existed beyond their usefulness condemns them, it does not speak to their glory, unless you fundamentally just believe that "Might Makes Right"
@@chompythebeast Answer this for me. If capitalism is terrible, why would YOU pay to own a laptop, smartphone, pairs of shoes, a vehicle or motorcycle, furniture, or anything else? Hm? Why do YOU participate?
There might come a time where ultra productive capital or post scarcely will require quite a intensive system shift. However I just don't see good real world examples of a Marxist industrial society so it seems like a risk bet to assume it'll work any better than the capitalist ones. Capitalism has been working for 250 years and over the course of intense changes to our society too, so this idea that capitalism is so unstable seems like a farce. A big issue I find with Marxist movements is they tend to put all the eggs of power in to one basket, so it can so easily turn into an authoritarian state. Also the turmoil caused by Marxist revolutions heightens the risk for power grabs and also majority obsession of minorities. Even if ideally your beliefs are for fairness and equity, your past efforts have utterly failed. Your criticisms of modern systems can be beneficial to help fix them, but as soon as you have power you prove to be just as flawed and human as our current rulers. I think y'all need to work alot more on assurances that your systems are resistant to power grabs. Until then I'll resist Marxist control, as a voter and worker
" Capitalism has been working for 250 years" Will, I have already lived through three significant recessions in 30 years. Thousands and thousands of people died with each one. That's stable, to you? An economy that not only murders the people who live at the bottom of it, but does so with predictable regularity? That's 'working'? "A big issue I find with Marxist movements is they tend to put all the eggs of power in to one basket, so it can so easily turn into an authoritarian state. " I can't help but notice that every country with rising authoritarianism right now is capitalist... "Even if ideally your beliefs are for fairness and equity, your past efforts have utterly failed. " Wow I wonder why people failed to build equality in countries the USA was flooding with chemical weapons
@@DeoMachina capitalism is better than the systems we left behind and you have yet to prove a working alternative. Many nations that have called themselves communist were authoritarian. You obviously aren't immune to corruption but seem just as if not more prone to corruption. It is a shame if peaceful socialist nations were destabilized be the US, I would be interested in seeing a working model of your system, if you can manage to avoid mass killings and dictatorship. Though being so easily destabilized is not a point in favor of stability, it's a point against it. I think the best why to fight against corruption is to spread out the institutions of power and have circular oversight. People checks government, government checks industry, a split up government, like we have, and split up of industry (no monopolies). Yall seem to keep putting government and industry under the same roof of power and you just end of with something closer to a company town than a free society.
@@willjapheth23789 "capitalism is better than the systems we left behind and you have yet to prove a working alternative. " I've got more evidence of socialism working than you do of capitalism working. "Many nations that have called themselves communist were authoritarian. You obviously aren't immune to corruption but seem just as if not more prone to corruption. " So why are most authoritarian states capitalist? " being so easily destabilized is not a point in favor of stability, it's a point against it. " I see, and by the same rationale, capitalism must be better because of how many millions of people it kills to sustain itself? Lmao okay Adolf settle down " People checks government, government checks industry, a split up government, like we have, and split up of industry (no monopolies). Yall seem to keep putting government and industry under the same roof of power and you just end of with something closer to a company town than a free society." When you accidentally start describing life under capitalism when talking about socialism...you've lost the argument.
@@DeoMachina if there's evidence then I wish this video's maker would go over it more and maybe not put Mao and Lenin all over his channel. Most nations are capitalist, I never said capitalism was immune. It's a economic system not a government one. And do those oppressive states never strong arm industry or nationalized industries they don't like at a will? Can you name some people I've supported killing? And none of the business owners around me have purposely killed anyone. I see you communist types openly talk about killing people and constantly not just defend but plaster the faces of killers and authoritarians everywhere. Why should I trust you as a average worker. My boss has never threatened to kill me. My existence would be illegal in many communist states as a bisexual, why should I want to live in your world. I'll vote against you, y'all are frauds and lovers of power. So far nations that call themselves communist have been nations full of nationalized industries. Yall never got rid of the hierarchy, you just made as new one with a direct line to a strong man at the top. Tell me when you figure out how to make a large stateless economy, cause so far yall seems addicted to state power. The days of loving small equitable tribes are over. You don't have a way to reproduce that on a large scale. We still live in the age of empires, capitalism or communism won't stop that, period.
@@willjapheth23789 "if there's evidence then I wish this video's maker would go over it more" I have some fantastic news " none of the business owners around me have purposely killed anyone" Miss me with the "capitalism is business owners" shit, please. "My existence would be illegal in many communist states as a bisexual" Weird you'd make this point during a period of time when capitalist states are clamping down on LGBT rights " I'll vote against you, y'all are frauds and lovers of power." Sorry dude, you don't get to make the 'you're just power hungry' argument if you think that the mass murder of socialists proves socialism doesn't work. All you've done is tell me those are the rules you want to play by. "Tell me when you figure out how to make a large stateless economy, cause so far yall seems addicted to state power" A special kind of irony writing this while in the USA lol
I’m not an economist so the concepts of surplus value and profit seemed to be equivalent. But when you said that the rise of automation reduces the number of workers which means surplus value falls that confuses me because wouldn’t the profit increase if you don’t have to pay workers?
You are lowering variable capital in favor of higher constant capital, as defined in the video. The automated system creating more products in less time also deflates the unit price of goods in an economy of scale. Automation and its maintenance are inelastic costs, while labor costs are always vulnerable to exploitation, meaning labor costs will never be the same or more than the value labor adds to the product being sold. That exploitation is what creates surplus value. The decrease in labor costs is offset by adoption and maintenance of an automated system, all while having the effect of laying off the workers who, now without a job, cannot contribute to the economy because they have no money to buy the products created. There are ways to combat this tendency, but you have to be pretty ruthless, rich and well-connected to pull it off.
@@NautilusXO right so the surplus value is directly tied to variable capital and is less the profit from the market but a representation of the value of transformative labour?Also thanks so much for replying I am a arts person so my Marxist identity is more an in depth understanding of the philosophy and a panicked kinda knowledge of the economic
@@annabellethorpe2542 you got pretty close to a correct understanding variable capital and surplus value. The specific distinction between is that variable capital is the portion of transformative labor that gets paid to the worker in order to support his basic existence and reproduction. Surplus value is the remaining portion of the transformative labor value that doesn't get paid to him, but instead is stolen from the worker by the capitalist. It is the unpaid portion of the laborer's value input into the product that the capitalist keeps for himself as profit.
It can go towards this...or, capitalism can divide the continents. Let me explain. S. America, Africa and Asia function as low payed uneducated workers. They "allow" big capitalists to extract surplus value from them in large quantities. They wont rebel becouse they need food to eat or simply dont know how. Meanwhile, in Europe, N. America and Australia, we feast on their fruits of labour, throwing away what ramains for them to scavange upon it. The 3 "pretty" continents function as a way to prove that capitalism works, while those continents fail bcs...well if u ask a capitalist why he will either be racist or say that it's colonialism fault, not understanding his contradiftions.
My point is that capitalism reached this point before. "Thankfully" it was in its colonialism period so it ramained. In 1950s when colonialism was falling, a new era began, the one where technology and societies of Australia Europe and N America may live in heaven as long as the other 3 live in hell. Why is this a new era? Because now, the grand 3 can never really help or let the minor 3 progess. We live in time of such censorship that the only time when we look at africa for the real state of it is when they show us how the UN is feesing them. We live in an ilusion thinking that capitalism is what brought us progress, while what it actually was are the minor 3. The worker continents.
That's why Mao Zedong believed that the revolutions are more likely to be successful in the poorer countries as they have the incentive to overthrow the capitalist. All they need is the guidance of the vanguard parties. Once the colonies have been freed, the imperial core will have no one to exploit except their own people which will only bring about the revolutionary potential of the western world itself.
@@HABACHI617 It wasn't. It was State Capitalism. Socialism is the workers universally owning the means of production. This is more humane than capitalism. The means of production don't need to be privately owned.
What happens when the American Empire inevitably falls, or when global capitalism inevitably disintegrates? Surely you don't think any status quo is immortal? Is your whole sociopolitical worldview predicated on nothing more than exploitation continuing to carry the day? That's a nakedly unscientific take on issues which I very much doubt you've considered
2 роки тому+4
This dude is the epitome of cognitive dissonance. 😂
I didn't really understand the crux of the matter, why does surplus value go down when you reduce variable capital, aside from the people not having the money to buy your products anymore?
no you understood it right. And if there is no one to exploit there is no surplus value so the capitalists lose the reason to produce on a capitalist basis. But they are still billionaires thats what i dont understand there then.
@@chrisgaming9567 They invented space travel? Lmao, what crack are you smoking? America invented the rocket, and Germany was the first to reach space with it. Russia can’t even maintain a nuclear submarine without them exploding and begging the UK for help.
Hakim is just so absurdly and wonderfully giggly on The Deprogram. It was kinda getting on my nerves a lil, tbh, but as I watch *this* video with it's ultra dry narration, I find myself really missing the life that is so prevalent in The Deprogram version of Hakim. Maybe there really is a goldilocks zone for that kind of thing, and I'm sure its location varies for each member of the audience. Just saying.... put some pizazz into it Hakim, but don't go off the wall giggling incessantly at Yugopnik's antics either! Or maybe I'm just a nitpicking loser who should stfu and enjoy the great leftist content. I guess I'm just a dipshit enlightened centrist, but it does seem like there is a safe middle ground, and the tone of this vid seemed like it was at the far end of the yawn spectrum. Informative, none the less! And that's what counts.
Support me on Patreon: www.patreon.com/ComradeHakim
Twitter: @YaBoiHakim
One of my favorite contradictions of Capitalism, here's a quick run-down of the falling rate of profit. Lemme know what you think!
*Sources and Further Reading:*
Testing Marx: Some new results from UK data, Cockshott
The historical transience of capital - The downward trend in the rate of profit since XIX century, Esteban Ezequiel Maito
Is There a Tendency for the Rate of Profit to Fall? Econometric Evidence for the U.S. Economy, 1948-2007, Basu
Is the Theory of a Falling Profit Rate Valid?, Cockshott
gesd.free.fr/lietal.pdf
trace.tennessee.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=en.wikipedia.org/&httpsredir=1&article=1293&context=utk_gradthes
journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0486613412447059
gesd.free.fr/mrwrate.pdf
thenextrecession.files.wordpress.com/2015/12/revisiting-a-world-rate-of-profit-june-2015.pdf
thenextrecession.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/uk-rate-of-profit-august-2015.pdf
thenextrecession.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/maito-esteban-the-historical-transience-of-capital-the-downward-tren-in-the-rate-of-profit-since-xix-century.pdf
ua-cam.com/video/ypJ_tcnfaWA/v-deo.html&ab_channel=PaulCockshott
ua-cam.com/video/_BkMiZze4ak/v-deo.html
Yo
Yo
The falling rate of profit contradiction only holds when goods turn into undifferentiated commodities. But capitalists aren't stupid. That's why they innovate, to keep their products from becoming undifferentiated. Don't believe me? Just look at the Apple iPhone. Believe me, there is NO WAY that Apple will allow the iPhone to become an undifferentiated commodity. And thus they will always work hard to innovate to stay profitable.
@@marcusantimony7535 The falling rate of profit isn't about whether a company sells more or less products, it's about how much it costs companies to make products vs how much money they make selling them. Also, innovation is definitely not the main factor when it comes to a company being successful (one of the main factors is probably marketing), Apple is a prime example of it, just look at their new SE, which is basically a recycled iPhone 8 with the A14 chip
Thank you for the observation,@@euso2008 , yes it is about companies making money: keeping profit margins up by keeping revenues greater than expenses. The point I'm making is that companies will always find new ways to sell - called innovation - they will not let the rate of profit decline over time as a result of technological change. Now whether a particular technology is recycled or not is somewhat irrelevant as long as the company is able to convince folks that something is worth the money. Is a Rolex 500 times better than a Casio? There are plenty of folks that think so.
Your first empirical reference happens to be authored by my macroeconomics professor (Minqi Li).
I’ll be sharing this with him, I think he’ll be ecstatic to see his work being shared with the masses!
that is awesome :)
and...? how'd it go?
@@TYsdrawkcaB He appreciated it. he’s been in the public eye before (his wikipedia article is fascinating if you’re curious) so this kinda thing isn’t new to him
@@jaredharmer7047 okay, that makes sense
We don’t even need empirical evidence to disprove capitalism the logical inconsistency alone is enough to completely discredit it
You somehow manage to be precise and clear without dumbing anything down!
He doesn't really dumb anything down, no, but he does simplify it a little for the sake of reaching a bigger audience with quicker, understandable ideas, from what I understand anyway (Spreading the message is a good thing, I'm not criticizing him for this.) Though there's probably an argument to be had as for whether simplifying things a little counts as dumbing something down or not, depending on who you're asking.
@@selearth3123 Yes, but he also links sources to quite serious texts in pinned comments, under all of his videos. So I think he strikes an amazing balance.
@@mcduckington Yes, though I don't think where that balance lies or if he does a good job of hitting it is a particularly interesting conversation. I just wanted to point out that simplifying it in the way he does will reach more people but also lose some in the transition from the video, to the sources and reading material, and that there's probably something to be said about the fact that some will leave with a simplified version of things because of it, compared to having a longer, more in depth video with less reach but where people leave with a better understanding of things, could be argued for as *effectively* dumbing something down a little, even when the extra reading and sources are provided.
I'm not gonna argue that point, as I think a wider reach, even at the cost of some deeper understanding, is exclusively a good thing. Just felt like it was worth to add that theres maybe a discussion to be had somewhere in there, hope that makes sense.
That’s the beauty of Marxism as a theory: while it has a technical language, it can be translated to more common talk with relatively little loss of content (and you can use that common talk to teach the more technical language). In that sense it’s the perfect theory of both the proletariat _and_ it’s vanguard!
@@martinreid2352 Unfortunately, the language of Marxism is often unhelpful. Referring to an employee as a 'worker' but an employer as a 'Capitalist' denies the often-occurring situation of the employer being a worker, too.
"Machines don't strike, they don't get sick, and they don't unionize"
....yet
Lol, never.
I'd love to see the day, when machines turn sick.
@@theamorphousflatsch2699 machines do tend to breakdown
@@ninjaorange5061 What you said is contradictory to the op and has no apparent relation to my comment, so why did you @ me?
@@theamorphousflatsch2699 actually a corona mass projection or emp would quite literally end modern society even moreso if everything is made by robots.
I think the hardest thing to understand is rate of profit vs. amount. We always hear about the record amount of profits that capitalists are enjoying, not how much smaller the rate is over previous generations.
They call it propaganda for a reason, Rob..
Dumb new conspiracy theory o' mine: inflation was invented to make long term trends and apples-to-apples comparisons as difficult as possible!
@@joshuamarx8209 yes, I guess you're right. But now you've got me thinking: I know what propaganda is, but I don't know the origin of the word. I got some googling to do.
@@snigwithasword1284 inflation is result of fractional reserve banking - tldr banks can emit money from thin air indefinitely. And that wasnt made so lizards can enslave humanity. It main point was to introduce cheap capital - in a full reserver banking you would never get a loan with EAR of like 5% a year. All you would get is 20% or more from a loan shark, or most likely no loan at all. Then demand and supply starts playing role - as more money exists its worth less.
@@marekg7259 It seems like the need for fractional reserve banking is tied to capitalisms failure to recirculate cash accumulated via profit. This ultimately leads to falling prices which prevents economic growth. Upstarts require loans (backed by asset value). This cash has to be added to compensate for hoarding of cash under something like a gold standard. Then later central banks had to be added because bank runs were so destabilizing. This creates the possibility of runaway inflation because a central bank will never have enough gold reserve to cover everyone's savings in a crisis. They have to start floating the currency sooner or later or they run into another crisis. This is why its so annoying arguing with "end the fed" idiots. They don't understand that central banks were invented to solve a crisis. Now central banks are gamed by capitalists to inflate asset prices, sure, but going back to a gold standard just creates an even worse problem. There is no solution because the system is just inherently fucked in the long run.
Thanks Hakim you really got me to stand firm in my Marxist ideals. Before this I was a Soc Dem who couldn’t commit to this ideology. Because of years of going to private school and getting Capitalist ideals drilled into my head. You have helped a lot. Thanks! You’ve really grown the movement.
Hakim is nothing.
@@apestogetherstrong341 what do you mean by this?
@@apestogetherstrong341 cope
@@pfffttt9563 gets obviously degenerating hakim not only that look at his user name. He obviously an agitator. Don't feed trolls.
I feel the exact same way. Hakim has been valuable source of knowledge! He is the best Marxist UA-camr out there.
I like to think of it as similar to the Second Law of Thermodynamics; that is, the net entropy of a system will always increase. It's the same reason that perpetual motion machines are impossible; you either need to bring in some source of fuel or energy from outside, or keep cycling the same energy without losing any -- and there are *always* losses, to things like friction, waste heat, etc.
Any given capitalist system always needs to be bringing in some sort of "fuel" from outside -- the whole "infinite growth on a finite planet" thing -- to sustain itself. You can imagine this on a smaller scale: a single capitalist company, corporation, organization, etc. *cannot* sustain itself with only its own employees as a customer base. It cannot pay its employees the full value of the work they are doing if it wants to make a profit (and the greater capitalist system means it *must* make a profit), therefore when they turn around and pay their wages back to the company as its customers, they won't be able to bring in enough revenue to pay the employees again and repeat the cycle. The amount of value that is being extracted from the workers is akin to the loss of energy in the perpetual motion machine: if there is any value extracted the system will slowly wind down, and there *must* be value extracted for the capitalist enterprise to survive.
Now scale this up to the whole planet.
Capitalism has colonized the whole world; there are no more sources of untapped, external wealth it can rely upon to fuel itself. It can now only cycle the same amount of wealth around endlessly, and the act of making a profit is continuously concentrating that wealth into fewer and fewer hands. As the wealth becomes concentrated, there is less and less for the wealthy to extract from the rest of the populace. Left to run long enough this will result in one omni-wealthy person owning everything and the rest of humanity impoverished, there will be no reason for the owner to provide anyone a job or sell them anything, because the owner already owns everything -- any transaction is net loss.
In practice, though, the system will rip itself apart long before it gets to that end state.
based just on how absurd the system always has been, and how people seem to take the increasing absurdity, if not in stride, seem to be adapting to it, i'm not so sure capitalism will do so. i think that we can observe that wealth inequality seems to be worse than at any other point of history, surpassing everything besides mansa munsa, and yet rebellion seems to be set in controlled ways, such as jan. 6th. that's not to say the successful cooptation of BLM in certain locations and with certain people. it's suprisingly durable, yet frail, just like a zombie. everyone know's it just a matter of time, but whenever you listen to even the most intelligent and informed, even they well tell you they have no clue when. i think it's more likely than some people would like to think, that this system will get even worse, and won't die within our lifetime. I'm not being pessimistic here, in fact quite the opposite. i think that we need to be assured that we need to act in order for it to topple, and that our action isn't an inevitability. it's demise isn't going to happen on its own, that it's not going to rip itself apart, we are the ones who are going to break relations, rather than relations being broken with or without us.
"Capitalism has colonized the whole world; there are no more sources of untapped, external wealth it can rely upon to fuel itself"
Maybe that's the reason behind the constant attempts to speculate on imaginary things ... NFTs, Cryptos, mortgage-backed securities etc. The trend is likely to pick up a lot in the coming years
@@anmolt3840051 That's actually something I have thought of for a long time. If the theory of labour value still work within capitalists system, and it still is, then what is the point of the service economy which people praised it to be the most advanced stage of the economy? You are practically a glorified warehouse, slapping price tags on things just to increase it's price without actually increase it's value? And what will happen when people eventually realized that the price of things have been inflated too much it's no longer getting anywhere close to it's real value? They will stop buying it and the pyramid scheme will collapse.
This comment reminded me of Econophysics
Second law of thermodynamics can be violated tho, entropy can decrease because of quantum fluctuations, but overall the law stands good.
When will it all end? We are trapped in a boom and bust cycle.
When it happens is up to us. Educate and organise, comrade. Do what you can each day to bring about the international proletariat revolution, and we'll overthrow the capitalist pigs together.
When capitalism ends...so never
@L When the sun in our solar system explodes and the universe disappears marxism will still the most retarded economical political ideology ever created . No amount of evolution will change that
Not anymore. No more booms coming
revolution, comrade.
"I told ya. I fucking told all of you."
- Karl Marx, Capital Volume I & III.
"What did you tell us?"
"Idk. I just told you"
"Yup total gonna happen, just you wait, you'll see, you'll all see"
pretty sure the Amish told everyone first, and unlike Marx came to a more sustainable and ethical solution, which I realize is damning with faint praise.
رمضان مبارك يا حكيم كل سنة وانت طيب
عرب كَمرادس
Whats funny about this, is that I was taught this same thing, but from a different angle in an MBA course. So on the one hand, Capitalist defenders will argue against such things, but on the other hand, Capitalists know full well it's the reality. They just spin it from being a flaw in the system to a game of trying to maximize your profit by finding where your "marginal profit" is 0. For you see, once you start producing beyond where your marginal profit is 0 and becomes negative, you are now making less profit with each additional unit you produce. And thats bad for business, so don't do that. No, don't think about the further implications that has for society, especially in industries which are monopolistic in nature.
Mashallah daddy Hakim has uploaded
"Kapitalism sucks. It's time to go beyond." There it is, folks. It really is that simple.
Likely sooner than later, Kapitalism is going to be dust-binned like every other political economy which preceded it. I find I take more and more pleasure watching the futile thrashings of the defenders of Kapitalism as the rotted system they champion (ironically, amongst many in the propagandized working class -- don't worry, we're gonna help you see the light) slips into accelerating decay. The future is Red.
Capitalism not kapitalism
Ojalá el sistema capitalista se caiga. (Not literal translation: May capitalism crash and burn)
Fun unrelated fact: Ojalá comes from the word inshallah.
Ojalá que no, de momento vamos ganando.
A ver cuando los comunistas hacéis algo que se pueda caer y no venga ya caido de serie, la verdad es que el capitalismo ha probado ser superior en todo aspecto, por eso es la fuerza hegemónica y el comunismo se cayó si es que alguna vez ha estado de pie.
It's nice to know that capitalism is bound to end one day. The bad thing is that there's a good chance that when it goes, it's going to take us all with it.
Also, I think that the title is a bit misleading - yeah, the falling rate of profit dooms capitalism to stagnation of basically all aspects of civilization, but it doesn't mean that capitalism will just disappear automatically when it hits the threshold - even if RoP is microscopic, there's still a way for the bourgeoisie to keep the system afloat by increasing exploitation and inequality even further, and keeping the plebs busy with BS jobs that have no real value.
It's great but I don't see a revolution in America in our life time. Anticommunist rhetoric has been ingrained in their heads for so long its practically a religion- All good in the world is capitalism; all bad in the world is communism. All good in the world is God; all bad in the world is the devil.
Class consciousness will never be reached in the country, sadly. However, America's economy is gonna collapse anytime soon so at least the rest of the world can have a revolution
@@TheQueen-sw4th I dunno, maybe it's in the eye of the beholder. I'm a Russian dude from a former Soviet country, and I think that we have even less chances than you guys :D
Sure, the word "communism" in the US media is a scarecrow that lost its meaning and gets thrown around as an insult, but if/when the US economy goes south and there's a problem with basic needs like food and water, you guys will have a lot of angry people, many of them armed.
Still, I think that the next generation has a much better chance to see a revolution than we do, regardless of the country. But there's definitely a rising tangible demand for social justice in the air everywhere even now, which gives some hope for a better future, if not for us then at least for our kids. No pasaran, comrades :)
@Ablaze Eclipse the bourgeoisie isn't a conscious being with rational thought, it's a social class and it is definitely on track to destroy humanity. Just look at global warming or the ecological disaster that is in the works. We are screwed unless we eliminate the bourgeoisie as fast as possible
@@vadimk3484 A former soviet country being less class conscious than America. May I ask where you live?
@@TheQueen-sw4th I live in Latvia. Don't be surprised about ex-USSR countries not being the vanguard of socialist ideas nowadays: shortly before the collapse of the USSR, during Gorbachev's Perestroika/Glasnost ("Reboot/Publicity"), massive anti-soviet, anti-communist and nationalist propaganda began everywhere, and continues to this day. In smaller countries, like mine, the main vector of propaganda was chauvinistic nationalism - "you red russki scum were oppressing us for decades, but now we are free". In Russia it was that too ("We had to feed a bunch of useless freeloaders from other Soviet republics for decades, but now we are free"), but mostly their anti-communist propaganda was/is about "freedoms" - how the USSR was a totalitarian prison with "mass murders of innocents by the government", "no free speech", "no political opposition" and "pathetic living standards" (the latter is "explained" by the lack of commodities like jeans or expensive cars).
Also, long before the collapse, the Soviet education system basically stopped being serious about thoroughly explaining even the basics of socialism to everyone. For example, most of the generation of my parents, who grew up in the sixties-seventies, doesn't know a darn thing about marxism, unless they had a university degree specifically in communist theory. Probably that was because the Soviet ruling bureaucrats stopped trying to build communism after Stalin's death and slowly began restoring capitalism, since most of the executive power belonged to them (bureaucrats), and not to the people (the Soviets/Councils). The gradual degradation and collapse of the USSR is a big topic, we can only scratch the surface in a single message, but the point is that it wasn't an explosive process, and rather a gradual one, spanning several decades, and the main root cause was probably the slow creep of power from democracy (Soviets) to the bureaucracy from the high ranks of the CPSU.
Micheal Roberts book, "World in Crisis: A Global Analysis of Marx's Law of Profitability" is an excellent collection of research papers summarized by him. It explores different countries and their specific issues they have. It also has a long list of references at the end of each chapter if you want to delve deeper into it. I highly recommend it.
Great video. I highly recommend Michael Roberts' blog in regards to this topic, he is a Marxist economist thats been covering this topic for up to a decade on there now and show a lot of evidence for how the rate of profit has fallen globally : "A world rate of profit: important new evidence
" for the post on this.
Can you name any industry which has collapsed due to the Falling Rate of Profit?
Beautifully explained as always, thank you for your great contribution to the left community.
True but he's talking about pure capitalism
@@crowned2088 🤓
I’m a moderate American Republican and it insults me that you think communism and or socialism have anything to do with the left.
@@BennyBigIron Communism is the far left in the political spectrum, Americans call democrats the left, which is bullshit
@@BennyBigIron that is literally the left...
Right now a game of musical chairs has started. We will be seeing movement of capital on an unprecedented scale. (in our adult lives) from stocks to bond funds.
Demand destruction is everywhere. How can gasoline be so high when millions of remote workers have yet to return to work?
The answer is taxes. Municipalities are hurting from lack of revenues; They have to issue debt in the form of bonds and service the bonds dividend/coupon payments. With no natural demand inflation is the only means these funds can be raised.
Taxes are a vehicle by which investers, bureaucrats and politicians can avoid labor.
One would have hoped all this capital would have put upward pressure on wages but not nearly enough. Unskilled labor commands 15$/hr these days.
Eventually wage increases will come but not before the redistribution of capital has taken place into bonds.
Very good video, i love how you explain complex marxist concepts very simply and straightforward, you are very talented.
Talented, but also incorrect in many places. Profit isn't made by underpaying wages. Marx also made this mistake.
@@lochnessmunster1189 how is profit made then?
@@alexwilkinson4896 Let's say you start a business which undercuts all your competitors. Their profits fall, and you make them as a result of them losing profits.
Great video as always. But I would add that capitalism may well transition back into feudalism due to the falling RoP, what is sometimes called rentier capitalism.
Looking forward to a video on "unequal exchange" since to me the notion implies value is created in distribution, a contradiction of vol 2 of Capital. edit: by which I mean it is the exploitation that is unequal, not the exchange, since the latter is subject to arbitrage.
This is what I've been thinking too. Yanis Varoufakis mentioned that the post-capitalistic society might be techno-feudalism. There's a video where he discusses with Slavoj Zizek in case you haven't seen it.
what is rop?
@@lightmorrison5404 Rate of profit
You must be delusional.
and rentier capitalism is different from communism how? 'muh vote'?
Your videos are high qualitiy and explain things better that one might understand trough reading.
Much love from germany
Boss makes a dollar, I make a dime. Thats why I listen to comrade hakims socialist propaganda on company time. Thansk comrade, you make the world a better place by educating one pleb at a time lol
Right so because he makes more money than you, that warrants socialism?
@@kingorange7739I mean yeah isn’t that the point of socialism? Did you watch Hakim video
@@Frizzleman I did and I don’t agree with that even slightly
Hey comrade, I love your content, but I find it hard to agree with your point made regarding automation (4:24-4:30). In the short run this can impact consumers disposable income, but in the long run technological advancement (including automation) tends to increase the standard of living (see the Solow-Swan growth model, in case you’re not familiar with it). Sometimes automation can also increase the marginal product of labour (MPL) which then increases the demand of labour.
Again, I am a HUGE fan of your videos, but I was reluctant to agree with that sentiment. Thanks!
You're in dire need of an introductory economics course. Ive already told you this so many times over but you're a slow learner.
i really dont know where to begin because you understand economics like a flat earther understands physics. your marxian math couldnt even qualify for highschool mathematical economics.
you said profit rate is surplus/capital investment.
if you use this basic production function derivation
y=[aP/w]^1/a-1
y is quantity output and the otherside is price output. you'll come up with a supply function. but supply function alone doesnt determine surplus/profit because supply is exogenous to demand. you cant supply more than what is demanded,hence more labor doesnt always mean more surplus. take water with very high utility and supply for instance. if marx was right that labor is value then water should be very expensive due to an over abundance of labor supplied for it. but the opposite is true. water is very cheap not merely because there's an abundance of supply for it. but rather because water is very easy to harvest hence there's ample of labor supply for it making it very cheap. the same case applies for monopoly and perfect market pricing. both have very different production and employment elasticities but nonetheless can sell products at very similar prices yet different quantities. perfect markets where cost is almost profit and monopolies with inelastic employment yet can sell cheaper products is a decisive proof that Labor only chases value(profit) and not yhe other way around.
we put labor on STUFF WE VALUE. we don't value STUFF because there's labor exhausted on it.
"you cant supply more than what is demanded"
My dude they're literally digging holes in the earth to throw excess goods into because supply is so high
They're LITERALLY coating Peru in unsold clothes because supply is too high
"take water with very high utility and supply for instance. if marx was right that labor is value then water should be very expensive due to an over abundance of labor supplied for it"
You're not making sense. Water is cheap because it literally falls from the sky. It's cheap because there's very little that needs to be done to make it a product!
I spent sixteen years gather a pile of dog poop. I'm asking $500,000.
@@proximaism The labour cost of treating, bottling and distributing water is relatively low, that's why it usually has a low price. Again, for labour to produce value it has to be expended on something useful. Say there's something with a very niche use value that requires a lot of labour to produce, it will still have a high value, it will still be expensive. Like that civet poop coffee, it has very niche use value, not much demand at all, but since it has such a large labour cost it's extremely expensive.
At this point it's a race between capitalism's inherent instability and Elon Musk inventing brain chips.
crazy how almost every single sucessfull country is capitalist (USA, almost all europe, canada, england, rusia, etc.), crazy how china only started to become a potency when it started to introduce capitalism into his economy, crazy how almost every single communist country has failed over and over again every single it tried to be implemented acroos different times, places, cultures and moments of history.
crazy how most socialist today come from sucesfull capitalist countries, crazy how most of say socialist are midlle class or upper class, almost like socialist its always wore by those that never taste it.
Communist critique is great at pointing out flaws, terrible at implementing solutions.
@@KyriosHeptagrammaton couldnt say it better, and like they say, everybody is a general once the batlle is over
"crazy how almost every single sucessfull country is capitalist (USA, almost all europe, canada, england, rusia, etc."
I mean...all the poorest countries are also capitalist. What's your point? Why doesn't capitalism work for the parts of the world that didn't lead globe-spanning empires?
" crazy how almost every single communist country has failed over and over again every single it tried to be implemented acroos different times, places, cultures and moments of history"
Wow I wonder if the slaughter of millions of people in those countries by US-backed armies had anything to do with their problems
Nah probably just coincidence lol
"crazy how most socialist today come from sucesfull capitalist countries"
Prove this.
" crazy how most of say socialist are midlle class or upper class"
ahahaha
Show me these upper class socialists, I'm dying to see this
@@DeoMachina
1. to answer your question: semi-socialism or socialist policies, just look at LATAM, argentina, venenzuela, mexico, soon chile, all of these countries where okay until they became slighty socialist.
2. ¨the american block did it¨ its the excuse of socialism for every single failure of the socialist system, cuba, china, urss, amlo in mexico, venenzuela, etc. and you know what? even if that was true and USA was powerfull enough to tear down so many countries, that would only prove that capitalism is better than socialism since a capatitalist country managed to take down at least 10 socialist countries.
3. dude, its in google, a lot of civils in USA, canada, europe, etc. are socialist, just look at the numbers of the democrat party
4. okay, here you go:
a) www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2021-09-14/met-gala-2021-aoc-tax-the-rich-dress (rich woman)
b) knowyourmeme.com/photos/2115227-political-compass (the famous ok boomer girl)
look, we can debate for hours, but at the end of the day is simple:
capitalism built walls to keep people outside, socialism build walls to keep people inside, theres no ground for a even match.
China may be capitalist, but they found a way to cheat the system
ua-cam.com/video/QNDNofOFjFI/v-deo.html
Based
You should be a Marxist professor.
Keep making good mateiral.
Nobody here has been able to name a single industry, at any time, which collapsed due to the bizarre Falling Rate of Profit Theory.
Hello from Turkey! I really enjoy your videos. They are very informative and can be a great entry point for people that dont really enjoy reading.
Totally random question but what do Turkish leftists think about Atatürk? I don't know anything about his economic policies but as an American, the idea of state enforced secularism/positivism sounds good.
@@jeffersonclippership2588 note: not Turkish, but I am interested on the country for family reasons.
While many thinks Atatürk did are probably good, I do think it is good to also acknowledge that he was very nationalist. This insistence that Turkey must be "Turkish" seems to have led to the mistreatment of Kurds up to this day.
@@jeffersonclippership2588 without a doubt that he was one of the most important figures in fighting against imperialism. his endeavors during and after the turkish liberation war gave us courage and reliance in choosing our own fate through rapid westernization and industrialization. in the early phase of turkish republic, there had been dozens of state-owned factories built and the efforts of self-sufficient turkey is somehow achieved. nevertheless, the growth and the surplus had not been embodied with the working class but rather turkish economy created its own turkish bourgeoise via several ways of accumulating wealth on the hands of a few entrepreneurs. we could have been a country like south korea or japan however historical process paved a completely different path for us. even though ataturk was not a leftist leader, his name will always be revered by turkish society and post-colonial nations as an emulating figure for fighting against imperialism.
@@kansuvo damn, wasn't expecting an answer. Thanks.
"Capitalism has failed, fails and will fail in each one of the societies where it puts its tentacles that are based on the expropriation and exploitation of man by man. That's what we fight!" - CARVALHO, João
dê a ordem camarada
When you look at the countries of the world which a) have the highest living-standards in the world for the ordinary people and b) have the highest living-standards that people have ever had in history, don't you think that the assertion "capitalism has failed" is untrue?
@@lochnessmunster1189 no, because these living-standards depends of the poverty on the third world. The wealth of rich countries come from colonialism, genocide, racism and the bombing of poor countries.
@@lochnessmunster1189 also, USA has millions of people living under food deserts and the UK has more homeless people than Brazil.
@@rsouzaneres No, it doesn't. Can you name me any of the world's poorest countries which are poorer now than they were 100 years ago?
How can bombing a poorer country, thus having to use wealth on weaponry, and making the other country poorer, make a richer country richer?
New Hakim video dropped! I love what you do, my friend. You helped me to radicalize further. And I know you want me to read more and not rely on UA-cam and podcasts, which I very much plan to. Still, your work has had such an impact on me. Thank you so much for what you do!
Can you think of a single industry which collapsed, due to this bizarre Falling Rate of Profit theory?
I absolutely adore the fact you provide sources for your videos and future reading. I always watch a documentary before reading a book, some people prefer to read only the books but me being a history junkie I like to see it as, the more the merrier.
Machines don’t strike or organize…yet
Like a house of cards, when it's built quickly with the only concern being profit, the house will fall
.. And that profit motive has also made thousands of innovations that changed mankind.
Also, you can't make profit without serving the interests of the consumer.
@@hazyorange No one denies capitalism has brought benefits to humanity. It is a step up from feudalism, which is a step up from slavery. But capitalism is not eternal. No economic system is. Just as capitalism replaced feudalism, socialism is the inevitable successor of capitalism.
Also regarding consumers, there indeed are products that people want, but have you also considered the reason why advertising is so in-your-face? To tell you to buy something, regardless if you need it or not. Consumerism and artificial demand are real things.
@@Astrobaut And yet everyone who has tried it eventually failed. Because of the lack of incentive to work(high wages), unpredictable planning(planned economies), and the persecution of success(killing the businessowners and landlords).
@Devil's Logic
1. No... no more...
2. True, but we can't make everyone incentivized to do hard work for their society, if they can't recieve consequences from not doing it, like getting fired for being lazy.
3. I don't know much about AI planned economy's, but I'll let that pass.
4. Business is not exploitation. You gain profit from providing a consumer for their needs, and if they don't, then according to the free market they will not.
@@hazyorange A Landlord isn´t doing any productive labour, the state/community can be a landlord as well, basically, all you need to do to be a landlord, is owning land and maybe hiring a janitor. Workers associations can easily do that as well.
The reasons, why socialist countries failed are complex, very complex, a bunch of different factors played a role, like oil prices, inefficient planning (that means, planning was done in an inefficient way, not that planning is generally inefficient), a lack of information, to much focus on heavy industry and the military-industrial sector, a certain amount of ignorance for structural problems which started to occur since the 60s, as already mentioned an unhealthy dose of outside interference, a hierarchy that was a little to static at some times, incompetence of some high ranking personell, and so on and so forth. None of these problems is the sole main reason why these countries failed, none of these problems would´ve been unfixable and none of them are inherent to socialism. That means, we can (and have) learned from them and make it better next time.
We´ll often hear the sentence "socialism has failed countless times, history as proven this and that", all of this is bullshit. History can´t prove anything, because it´s not a natural science or math, it´ll never repeat itself. And Socialism hasn´t failed countless times, it has failed a few times, like every new ideology did the first few times it was tried. That´s normal and no proof of anything. Nobody get´s it perfect the first few times.
Of course we are just humans and thus we´ll never be able to create a perfect functioning system, and eventually, everything, that we as humanity do, will probably fail. The thing is, we defintely know, that this will be the case with capitalism, and we have the choice, to replace it with a better system as soon as we can, or cling to and go down with it
*its so sad and hilarious Americans dont have universal healthcare lol*
There is quite a few downsides to universal healthcare. For instance, my Grandmother was given a drug which made her blind. They did this because the drug which had no risk of making you blind cost slightly more. She would have happily paid for it out of her own pocket, but Canadian healthcare laws don't let you have that option.
Another issue is your health problems cost everyone. Smoke? Overweight? Poor immune system? You're a drain on society. Perhaps these dead weights shouldn't be given priority healthcare. We can't help everyone after all. Then you have the government regulating how you live your life. Mandatory exercise. No medical aid if you have don't have your shots. No drinking. No smoking. No drugs or we won't help you.
If shots are mandatory, well, why not start testing theories? For the greater good of course. Like the Tuskegee Study (Black people given fake treatment for AIDS). Or operation SeaSpray(San Francisco purposefully bio-attacked by government). But this time it's easy to get away with. They're mandatory, you can't even be cautious if you want to.
What Americans need is a better system. They spend so much on healthcare per person it is ridiculous.
@@KyriosHeptagrammaton why don't we just get rid of all disabled people? No more drain
@@JV-uo7zz i am amazed how you leftists manage to do such terrible scarecrows falacies.
Like you must be totally tard in order to think that he meant that, which i am totally sure that you are, the true problem of humanity it is ppl like you that fail to think logically, that brings inefficacy and inefficiency thus poverty and recession, how many Berlin walls need to fall in order you to open your eyes.
Taxes
What's the difference, you pay in taxes we pay directly.
Great video as usual?! Would love to see a video on unequal exchange and value transfer in the future.
Can you name any industry, anywhere, that ever collapsed due to the Falling Rate of Profit theory?
Great use of diagrams when showing impact of technological advancement!
omg daddy hakim
I always heard "communism doesnt work" growing up. I'm not sure what form my ideal communist society would take, but it sure as hell seems like capitalism doesnt really "work" either.
I never even heard that, it was always just dismissive attitudes towards any socialist ideas at all. I was discussing communism with my dad, and I asked him what he thought communism meant. He said, "It's when a country is led by a dictator, and strips the rights of citizens by forcing them to work."
He doesn't believe in capitalism, in fact he hates most capitalist ideas. He was just brainwashed since he was a kid to believe that communism = authoritarianism. He's a socialist now since I've educated him.
Except capitalism does work
@@justsomeguy6336 It's working exactly as designed, keeping the poors poor and the rich rich
@@Nae_Ayy Poor people are poor because of their own choices.
@@justsomeguy6336 Poor people are poor for a variety of reasons, namely being born into poverty, poverty causing stress, stress lowering decision making skills, and bad financial decisions being made. I wouldn't expect a believer of capitalism to admit that, though.
Love these more heavy-on-theory videos out here. Keep up with the great work! Thanks.
"capitalism failled, fails and will fail in each of the societies embraced by its tentacles which are based on the exploration and expropriation of men by itself"
~Carvalho João
Most Communist movements: *scream as they get stomped out by Capitalists post-Soviet collapse*
Capitalism: Fine, I'll do it myself
*hits self destruct button*
This is my favourite video to check the comments in
same lol
the title imply it's communism is somehow different,
here's a PSA: **no system is impervious to failure.**
there's one constant with civilisations through history, it's that systems will *inevitably fail* because of their respectives short-comings.
if you're debating "[insert system] good/bad", then you already missed the fucking point.
And if you're calling for a complete upheaval, you're only accelerating that process.
@@KyriosHeptagrammaton yeah, that's right
systems aren't meant to be a constant, they're meant to strive, and then be switched with the most appropriate one once it started declining.
Soooooooo where can you convince me that a communist nation won’t end up in a oligarchical dictatorship???
I think he's debunked that myth in a few of his videos
Captialism leads to a oligarchical dictatorship
>machines dont unionize
For now.. ;)
Can you please make a video on Stalin, his policies and give your analysis of what the positives and negatives were during his era
So basically eventually there will be no incentive to invest for the capitalists because the amount of profit gained form improving production methods will be too low to justify investment risk?
This
I was just nerding out about TFRoP today lol. Great video!
You should do a video on the DOTP and misconceptions surrounding it
This argument relies on a few weird assumptions. One, that life is a zero sum game. If you automate a job there will be no other jobs. This is not true. Computers in the middle-ages wouldn't be able to find employment in the modern age, but they could get a job as a programmer or mathematician. Farmers can get jobs as artisans now that farming is done by a tiny % of the population rather than everyone.
Second, as pointed out in the first paper you cite "The fall of the profit rate and profit share reflected rising wage and taxation costs. "
Sounds like a good thing to me. If you have a bunch of serfs, of course you'll have more profit than if you have high paid employees and social programs.
Third if capitalist start losing money because of cruelty to workers they'll be less cruel. "The profit focused people not caring about profit" is not ironic, it's an incredible short sighted and facile criticism of the system. The reason we have 8 hour work days now was because Ford lowered it to increase profit. That's the whole point of capitalism. It's self-correcting.
Marx was great a pointing out problems, but an incredible narrow focused, short sighted, greedy wastrel whose solutions were worse than useless. He spent far more money than most people of his time, more than his family could afford. If Marx himself can't keep to his share, the system was doom from the start.
"Farmers can get jobs as artisans"
Bro even artists can't get jobs as artisans come on
"Third if capitalist start losing money because of cruelty to workers they'll be less cruel"
Oh yeah the historical record is full of examples of this. Mm, totally. Definitely no tendency for capitalists to double down and support extremist political factions that suppress workers when things are tough. Nope. Never happened across the world or anything.
"That's the whole point of capitalism. It's self-correcting."
Let me know when it lasts for more than 20 years without crashing and we'll talk about self-correction.
"If Marx himself can't keep to his share, the system was doom from the start."
This isn't remotely logical. Marx was wrong because of how he lived his life? What next? Einsteins theory of relativity is wrong because he married his relative? This is playground shit, man.
Marx simply described the economic system he lived in. His claims are all verifiable and easily proven.
hey dy=umbie right wingers bpurguise automation is to make system efficient yes it replace jobs but very few in those place cause massive unemployment aka job loss
I like the insinuation that automation of say, a hundred warehouse jobs would be filled by a sudden demand for a hundred programmers and maintenance workers to maintain the 6 robots that were installed to replace them. You reactionaries need to get some better arguments
lol, capitalism has been there for centuries, while socialism hasn't worked for even 40 years straight lol.
It's only recently now with all the government interference in the economy that we have all these crises
@@Gangst3r4ever Uh...Have you heard of the great depression? Greatest economic crisis ever and it was government that slowly made the situation better.
@@legrandliseurtri7495 That's a myth. Look into it more. It was the war that changed things. Anyway you keep believing in your higher corrupt power. Hell you can even pray to it for all I care. But remember all the stuff that went on with Covid because of governments.
@@legrandliseurtri7495 yes the government helped in those crisis because it were the government regulations that induced them lol
Feudalism has existed for centuries. However, that does not mean that it's a good economic system. The same can be said for capitalism. Secondly, the Chinese Communist Party has definitely been in power for more than 40 years. Finally, socialism (in China) has done more than just function. It's propelled a previously backward, agrarian society that regularly experienced famine into the position of being a global superpower.
Of course profits tend to 0. That means maximum efficiency was reached. This allows innovation in other sectors since economic subjects tend to search profit, new markets will be created and so new opportunities for profit. The fact that profits tend to go towards 0 means also that resources get used in the most optimal way, which is essential for a species to survive and evolve (You can find something similar in evolutionary biology). In essence capitalism is just the optimal way to use resources in a world where resources a limited.
I believe your understanding of evolutionary biology in this context isn’t correct. Biologically speaking, the pressures that the environment places on the organisms in it (and that they place on each other, since organisms are a part of their environment) do not “push” organisms to optimize their reproductive strategies. Instead, the strategies that fail don’t get passed on. It’s not really careful consideration of resource use, it’s random selection filtered through the present environmental pressures. The amount of “waste” (in this metaphor, the number of individuals who die before reproducing) is astronomical. It can hardly be considered an optimal process that produces an optimal output. Evolution seeks “good enough” not “as good as it can be”.
In many cases, successful strategies aren’t exactly what we would call “efficient” in the resource use or optimized output meaning of the term. You could theoretically design a more well-suited, more efficient organism for a given system (or introduce one in the case of some invasive species), but only in terms of its ability to reproduce. At the end of the day that’s all that’s being “optimized” for and even then the bar for “optimization” is being moved constantly because of the shifting nature of the environment.
The scare quotes here are intentional. The drive for efficiency in resource use or in production isn’t a thing nature as a whole pressures for. That’s a human drive. One we might have gotten from evolutionary processes and has given us a rather large leg up on other animals, but that doesn’t mean this is what evolutionary processes tend towards. At the end of the day, I’d not press the incredibly random nature of evolution into the box of an optimizing process. That’s personifying evolutionary processes, it’s not how they work.
@@elizabethhicks4181 I meant at a micro scale and not makro. At a micro scale they do strive for resource optimization. That said I'm no biology expert
Oh so destroying everything for money is the optimal way to use resources?
@@Gigachad-mc5qz The concept of destroying everything for money is just wrong. Are we extracting resources? Yes. Would any other type of civilisation extract the same resources? Yes. Is a free market capitalistic model with profit incentives the most optimal way to USE those resources? Yes.
Any type of organisation would use the same amount of resources, the profit incentive is just here to use these resources better.
Of course you can argue that the profit incentive tends to push the use of these resources to the limit, but you have to understand that this way the most amount of people will benefit from them.
@@borde02 how will people benefit if we are destroying the only planet in the entire fucking universe we know of that supports conplex life. You see that as profit? I dont
I always get hypnotized by the machines in the backgrounds of your videos, it's so satisfying
Yay! Smart Daddy Hakim posted!
Wouldn't an easier TLDR summary be: as industry automates more and more the only way to stay competitive is to keep dropping prices, leading to the point that each unit sold is only marked up by pennies. But also since you've laid all your workforce off they can't afford your products even at that low mark up?
I havent seen much product dropping in price, they usually increase, unless they are rare product that havent been manifactured in large quantity, they drop a bit after.
whats up with that?
@@MilouPaint As the economy tends towards monopoly, the smaller and smaller number of firms controlling the market start seeing their profits fall. There's a couple ways to combat this, and if you're share of the market is big enough, one way you can do this is to increase prices. Since you hold such a large share of the market you can muscle out competition that tries to under sell you and consumers won't be able to acquire your products from any other firm, meaning the goods you sell will become increasing inelastic. Your rate of profit will continue to fall despite this though, it's just a means to slow the process.
the workforce is what makes profit necessary. as the workforce becomes more obsolete, so does profit. we're witnessing this in real time, profit is already serving diminishing utility for the ruling class.
to their credit communists unlike capitalists at least foresaw this, but they're still utterly delusional about the outcome. the post-profit, technocratic world will not be a utopia, quite the opposite. profit has been the only regulating force tethering materialism to the consequences of its ungodly inhumanity. with that gone, you will live to see manmade horrors beyond your comprehension.
@@Normie_Normalson Yay!!! Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhyagn!
@@Normie_Normalson Can you explain this to me like I’m a child? I struggle to understand economics.
This is sort of why I'm gradually coming around to the Varoufakis view. I'm not so sure that capitalism is the system we're living under anymore. It seems that capitalism―left to run rampant via the failures of the left on one side and the stubborn nature of elites on the other―has evolved into something even more rapacious. Techo-feudalism is the age we are living in and it is terrifying.
So terrifying that you’re living in the best times in history, even in poverty?
@@kenos911 That is so very far from the truth that I don't even know how to respond.
@@surgeland9084 I mean, technically it was the 90s, but if you’re in a developed country, and even if you aren’t, we’re living with the best living standards in history. Society as a whole is garbage at functioning, and that’s shown across history
ua-cam.com/video/bMZe7cA1TUw/v-deo.html
@@kenos911 it's indeed terrifying that people still believe in demonstrably false delusions like "that you're living in the best times in history", as if climate change / global warming, covid pandemic, global food crisis, coming economic recession, etc just doesn't exist ua-cam.com/video/fo2gwS4VpHc/v-deo.html
ua-cam.com/video/Co4FES0ehyI/v-deo.html
ua-cam.com/video/-S-CwVJxxug/v-deo.html
I can't speak for anyone else, but if it wasn't for some rich man giving me a job and paying me less than I'm worth, and me working hard at two different jobs at one time I wouldn't be nearly out of debt now. I do great. It is too bad you don't. I own my own property and it don't bother me that there are rich people at all. Every success story using capitalism is always gonna be a black eye for socialism. So I don't need some guy who lived off his woman telling me how capitalism is gonna implode on itself and how socialism will save the race. I put God first and work hard, and I am successful, even if I'm not a millionaire. You just can't argue with success. Enjoy the theory.
Why do you think that he (hakim) is complaining about this kind of system which causes imperialism as an economical system to exploit the resources, labor and markets of 3rd world nations? Maybe it is because the 1st world imperialist countries systematically destroyed Iraq (his native country) to exploit the resources (oil) and to implement a neoliberal puppet state? And if you don't know he has a job as a doctor if I remember correctly so insulting him like this is a bit stupid.
And what exactly does your "success story" change anything about the systemical poverty and imperialism? Maybe someone wants to become a teacher and can't afford it to study because of his student debt.
You are stuck on catch words. In reality, I was out of work and sleeping in a storage unit, with 4 dollars. I know all about poverty sir. It is no excuse to not succeed. I never got welfare. I got a job. Today, I have property and a home that is paid for. I am just about out of debt. I owe a little bit on my car. I put God first and didn't play the victim. A smart student finds a way to get want they want without begging the government for a handout.
@@Nietzsche2329 it sounds like it really bothers you that God enabled me to succeed without complaining about the government. Else you wouldn't bother trying to compete with words. The other countries have their leadership. try to start blaming them for their mismanagement if your are intent on assigning blame. Each country is its own family. You don't respect your own parents, your enemies won't either and you are stuck with being humiliated. You just try to go to Russia and burn🔥 their flag down and see what happens to you. You will be put to death for disrespectful behavior. Other countries don't tolerate things the way the USA does. I also read about visiting Thailand. You don't wanna go there without reading the dos and don't. You will be in jail, if you violate their rules, no its ands or buts.
@@Nietzsche2329 I was referring to Karl Marx living off his woman. Sorry, I didn't make that clear.
Thank fucking god that those red bottles lined up by the end of that clip. I was gonna unsub if you cut it off before it became satisfying!
Bruh when they finally clicked into place I was so content.
I want the government to give me lots of money and lots of freedom. Think that's a problem?
It's one or the other.
Banger as always
If you want to know what peak capitalism looks like, then look no further than my own country (Lebanon).
Oh really? What kinds of things are happening there in this regard? I live in the US and I really don't know anything about it.
@@YourCapyFrenBigly_3DPipes1999
after the civil war, Lebanon's infrastructure was almost entirely destroyed after years of indiscriminate bombing campaigns by Israel. The state had become too fractured and weakened to do anything about it and a wealthy capitalist tycoon named Rafik Hariri personally stepped in to renovate most of the country. He appropriated much of our public facilities and properties often through ruthless and unscrupulous means and things like public transport, sanitation, etc. were privatized and many lower-middle class neighbourhoods once teaming with life and economic activity were replaced with luxury shops and skyscrapers that no one could afford and were mostly used as a front for money laundering. Rent as a result skyrocketed and many people were left unable to live in their own cities anymore and impoverished. Not to mention the horrendous banking policy that was implemented that turned the country from a relatively self-sufficient economy with diversified modes of production into a shitty tax haven style economy which produces very little and became reliant on begging for scraps by the IMF.
I sent you a DM Hakim!
Also, awesome video
Got a crypto ad on this video lmao
Great explanation! One concern I've had about this is the, let's say, countervailing tendency to perpetual warfare that is especially worrying. We don't have a definitive picture of just how sustainably capitalism can build, destroy, and rebuild to destroy again (short, probably, of the ultimate environmental catastrophe we're accelerating toward). It's important to emphasize that, in-built self-destruct though it is, there's nothing mechanistic or fatalistic about this tendency. We can't just wait for the rate of profit to spontaneously collapse and then build socialism. We may not have that long.
I thought that simply competition made businesses want to lower total price and with that also the rate of profit, thus making rate of profit tend to decrease (when not in a monopoly), pretty simple if I say so myself.
The idea is that when the rate of profit becomes 0 in an industry, all the businesses in that industry will begin losing money and the amount of money/capital will decide how long the businesses will last. Then at some point there will be only one business, which due to lack of competition can create a monopoly and skyrocket prices and thus the rate of profit too, while destroying competition through a more qualitative product and a more efficient production line.
IN theory, this should make people want to revolt, to change system to a more sustainable, socialism, but due to lack of inflation of prices and due to the prolonging of this (competitive) capitalist stage, due to a stable increase in technology or increase in the economy (globalization/neo-imperialism), the people of said capitalist countries didn't want to change their ways.
Because why be a communist when business is booming.
However, things are changing. Technology is not improving as fast as it used to, and the economy can't expand. Due to this, the economy WILL make businesses fail and thus monopolize and create a mayor drop in standards of living. This will in turn completely screw the proletariat and make them angry and revolt.
Besides, the historically economically powerful economies of Europe and NA are beginning to lose their powerful positions and giving it to countries like China, Brazil, Russia and India. This will make the neo-imperialist relations reverse and make us the Second World and the new powerhouses the First World. Which is very worrying for the nations which use countries like China to make all their products and have lost much of their old industry for that reason. Some economies will just cease because of this, making the standards of living plummet and making the proletariat angry once again.
This will cause a change in political ideology due to so many people being mad. But let's hope it will also be a communist one instead of a fascist/feudal one, which is kinda likely due to the amount of rightists versus leftists one Europe and NA.
I expect a new industrial revolution in Europe and NA too, which will return the industrial sector of Europe and NA to Europe and NA instead of the nations of the nowadays Periphery and Semi-periphery.
Why would Socialism slow-down environmental catastrophe?
@@lochnessmunster1189 because there is no excuse for bad stuff.
Without profit incentives the most important thing is survival and survival of future people and that is a very noble cause; way more important than short term consumption.
@@fakedoorsfordinner1677 Okay, but how would a Socialist model, which uses the same materials to product the same goods in the exact-same way, be less environmentally-destructive?
And how do you eliminate profit incentives?
@@lochnessmunster1189 If you are getting what you need and are not possible to gain more than you need, than you stop working to better your boss, and start working on other things like: to better yourself, your community and your future and other possible life improvements.
Work will be directly beneficiary to the people doing it, instead of the indirect "here is some conpensation" type.
This means more overall freedom and less alienation away from your community, friends and family.
People will be their community and their community will be their friends.
That's how it ought to be, imo (in my oppinion).
Correction: when the organic composition of capital and the decline in the rate of surplus value indicates not an absolute fall in the cost of labour power but a *relative* fall (i.e. a larger portion of the value in the outlay is from the means of production). If labour costs 1 unit of value, and machinery 1, then later labour costs the same amount and machinery 2, the organic composition of capital has risen relative to labour power, but the absolute quantity of labour power is constant. Since machinery does not produce value, the value of final goods is therefore closer to the value of the outlay and the rate of surplus value can therefore fall, which causes an aggregate decline in the rate of profit, since prices only distribute values.
Speak the truth, Awesome vid! 💯
Hakim i envy you so much. Your elequence in explaining socialism and communism makes me really jealous that i cant :(
That's the point of socialism. Be jealous or envious of what someone else has. It's a terrible idea and mentality.
@@chris135x joe mama
@@chris135x No, that you projecting you own flaws onto other people. You're full of BS.
That's just you resorting to emotional attacks in order to defend your ego.
Socialism is the better economic system by a landslide.
It's not even a choice at this point.
It's go Socialist or go extinct. Pick one.
@@imawetad8870 That guy's "mama" should have aborted him. She'd be doing the world a favor.
Why did you make this video it's not real capitalism since real capitalism has never been tried *sarcasm*
I didn’t see the *sarcasm* at the end and I was about to go off on you lol
Actually it's not real sarcasm. Real sarcasm has never been tried!
Capitalists: Who needs their surplussy ate?
Decreasing amounts of people: Omg me!
Delete this
@@AAA-qm9km I can't delete your comment.
Hell no
This theory may be more relevant than ever with the introduction of AI. AI is a "renewable resource" in that it mostly take jobs and not give. The recent layoffs should tell you all about it.
Yep, I really want to be an artist but AI might ruin my future. All those AI companies care about is profit from stealing copyrighted work and taking away jobs.
Yes, but have you considered that Vuvuzela no iPhone no food billions strangled by Stalin personally?
He never thought to consider that's corporatism totalitarian 1984 jorge jorwel no family all same wage no toothbrush see see pee our ponies sparrows khmer rouge uyghur national socialism molotov ribbentrop castro stole my grandpa's livestock haircut jim jong un made me eat dragonflies look good theory but practice china tibet owner take risk classist much iceland ancap pilgroms socialist no work human nature, hmmm?
I can imagine Liberty prime, except Socialist.
And one of his limes is "Capitalism is death!"
"Capitalism is death"- the world's population is higher now than at any point in human history, and the ordinary people are wealthier than ever before.
Finally, a cheerful area to explore... Leave it to Hakim! Thank you, yes, let's get on with this inevitable collapse & on to building a decent future to share!
There's no "inevitable collapse"- Marxists have been saying this for more than 100 years. Economies dip, and then rise again.
It would be interesting to see what countries clothes and such were made in.
Chinese labor is cheap so they are made there.
Then the people want more wages, why can't they just be good slaves, so production moves to India.
Then to Burma, then Indonesia, maybe back to Erupoe(sic) next.
Coorrelate(sp) that to profit and revenue.
Call me when Soviet Union will work- oh wait
Because as we all know, Democracy failed forever when Athens fell
You'd be the guy calling fire too radical and screaming that the wheel would never work because we've done without it before
@@chompythebeast That doesn't make any sense. He's saying that socialism and communism is bad because it has been tried many times before and it failed every single time.
Wish I had this handy for my dissertation 2 yrs ago lol. Nice video
What we shouldn't really be afraid of is a robot revolt, but if one never comes to pass after the capitalists create the first batch. If the billionaires, of whatever species, are able to keep their infinitely loyal consumerist robot slaves on a leash, that's it for both humanity and robots.
"infinitely loyal"- what does that mean exactly?
@@maltheopia Ah- do you mean robots who are working, or are consuming?
@@maltheopia But how can robots be "slaves" to an owner? Is a printing-press a "slave" in the same way? And what's the point having consumerist robots?
@@maltheopia OK, but are you talking about robots which have been manufactured by the owners of the production? Also, what exactly do you mean by "exploitation"?
I saw this thumbnail like 3 times and assumed it was a video from non-compete. I wonder why my brain did this?
How come capitalism is still successful and every example of socialism and communism never lasts more than a few decades?
Nato.
Capitalism = power
Power = routine
"How come capitalism is still successful"
[citation needed]
"and every example of socialism and communism never lasts more than a few decades?"
[citation needed]
Ask yourself this: How come kings ruled the world for so many centuries, if American democracy is so great? The answer is state murder, called law. Feudalism was replaced. Capitalism, too, will be replaced. Their having existed beyond their usefulness condemns them, it does not speak to their glory, unless you fundamentally just believe that "Might Makes Right"
@@chrisgaming9567 You need citations cause you're too ignorant.
@@chompythebeast Answer this for me. If capitalism is terrible, why would YOU pay to own a laptop, smartphone, pairs of shoes, a vehicle or motorcycle, furniture, or anything else? Hm? Why do YOU participate?
There might come a time where ultra productive capital or post scarcely will require quite a intensive system shift. However I just don't see good real world examples of a Marxist industrial society so it seems like a risk bet to assume it'll work any better than the capitalist ones. Capitalism has been working for 250 years and over the course of intense changes to our society too, so this idea that capitalism is so unstable seems like a farce.
A big issue I find with Marxist movements is they tend to put all the eggs of power in to one basket, so it can so easily turn into an authoritarian state. Also the turmoil caused by Marxist revolutions heightens the risk for power grabs and also majority obsession of minorities. Even if ideally your beliefs are for fairness and equity, your past efforts have utterly failed.
Your criticisms of modern systems can be beneficial to help fix them, but as soon as you have power you prove to be just as flawed and human as our current rulers.
I think y'all need to work alot more on assurances that your systems are resistant to power grabs. Until then I'll resist Marxist control, as a voter and worker
" Capitalism has been working for 250 years"
Will, I have already lived through three significant recessions in 30 years. Thousands and thousands of people died with each one. That's stable, to you? An economy that not only murders the people who live at the bottom of it, but does so with predictable regularity? That's 'working'?
"A big issue I find with Marxist movements is they tend to put all the eggs of power in to one basket, so it can so easily turn into an authoritarian state. "
I can't help but notice that every country with rising authoritarianism right now is capitalist...
"Even if ideally your beliefs are for fairness and equity, your past efforts have utterly failed. "
Wow I wonder why people failed to build equality in countries the USA was flooding with chemical weapons
@@DeoMachina capitalism is better than the systems we left behind and you have yet to prove a working alternative.
Many nations that have called themselves communist were authoritarian. You obviously aren't immune to corruption but seem just as if not more prone to corruption.
It is a shame if peaceful socialist nations were destabilized be the US, I would be interested in seeing a working model of your system, if you can manage to avoid mass killings and dictatorship. Though being so easily destabilized is not a point in favor of stability, it's a point against it.
I think the best why to fight against corruption is to spread out the institutions of power and have circular oversight. People checks government, government checks industry, a split up government, like we have, and split up of industry (no monopolies). Yall seem to keep putting government and industry under the same roof of power and you just end of with something closer to a company town than a free society.
@@willjapheth23789 "capitalism is better than the systems we left behind and you have yet to prove a working alternative. "
I've got more evidence of socialism working than you do of capitalism working.
"Many nations that have called themselves communist were authoritarian. You obviously aren't immune to corruption but seem just as if not more prone to corruption. "
So why are most authoritarian states capitalist?
" being so easily destabilized is not a point in favor of stability, it's a point against it. "
I see, and by the same rationale, capitalism must be better because of how many millions of people it kills to sustain itself? Lmao okay Adolf settle down
" People checks government, government checks industry, a split up government, like we have, and split up of industry (no monopolies). Yall seem to keep putting government and industry under the same roof of power and you just end of with something closer to a company town than a free society."
When you accidentally start describing life under capitalism when talking about socialism...you've lost the argument.
@@DeoMachina if there's evidence then I wish this video's maker would go over it more and maybe not put Mao and Lenin all over his channel.
Most nations are capitalist, I never said capitalism was immune. It's a economic system not a government one. And do those oppressive states never strong arm industry or nationalized industries they don't like at a will?
Can you name some people I've supported killing? And none of the business owners around me have purposely killed anyone. I see you communist types openly talk about killing people and constantly not just defend but plaster the faces of killers and authoritarians everywhere. Why should I trust you as a average worker. My boss has never threatened to kill me. My existence would be illegal in many communist states as a bisexual, why should I want to live in your world. I'll vote against you, y'all are frauds and lovers of power.
So far nations that call themselves communist have been nations full of nationalized industries. Yall never got rid of the hierarchy, you just made as new one with a direct line to a strong man at the top. Tell me when you figure out how to make a large stateless economy, cause so far yall seems addicted to state power. The days of loving small equitable tribes are over. You don't have a way to reproduce that on a large scale. We still live in the age of empires, capitalism or communism won't stop that, period.
@@willjapheth23789 "if there's evidence then I wish this video's maker would go over it more"
I have some fantastic news
" none of the business owners around me have purposely killed anyone"
Miss me with the "capitalism is business owners" shit, please.
"My existence would be illegal in many communist states as a bisexual"
Weird you'd make this point during a period of time when capitalist states are clamping down on LGBT rights
" I'll vote against you, y'all are frauds and lovers of power."
Sorry dude, you don't get to make the 'you're just power hungry' argument if you think that the mass murder of socialists proves socialism doesn't work. All you've done is tell me those are the rules you want to play by.
"Tell me when you figure out how to make a large stateless economy, cause so far yall seems addicted to state power"
A special kind of irony writing this while in the USA lol
i may have covid right now but ill still get my daily marxist theory in thank you hakim for teaching everyone
Ay covid gang. Also Alba saor à Alba Nuadh 🏴
Based profile picture!
I also have covid lol
@@Partial_Invisibility Too good to be true I would say.
Insha Allah!
It's beautiful to meet another muslim Marxist :D
I’m not an economist so the concepts of surplus value and profit seemed to be equivalent. But when you said that the rise of automation reduces the number of workers which means surplus value falls that confuses me because wouldn’t the profit increase if you don’t have to pay workers?
You are lowering variable capital in favor of higher constant capital, as defined in the video. The automated system creating more products in less time also deflates the unit price of goods in an economy of scale. Automation and its maintenance are inelastic costs, while labor costs are always vulnerable to exploitation, meaning labor costs will never be the same or more than the value labor adds to the product being sold. That exploitation is what creates surplus value. The decrease in labor costs is offset by adoption and maintenance of an automated system, all while having the effect of laying off the workers who, now without a job, cannot contribute to the economy because they have no money to buy the products created. There are ways to combat this tendency, but you have to be pretty ruthless, rich and well-connected to pull it off.
@@NautilusXO right so the surplus value is directly tied to variable capital and is less the profit from the market but a representation of the value of transformative labour?Also thanks so much for replying I am a arts person so my Marxist identity is more an in depth understanding of the philosophy and a panicked kinda knowledge of the economic
@@annabellethorpe2542 you got pretty close to a correct understanding variable capital and surplus value. The specific distinction between is that variable capital is the portion of transformative labor that gets paid to the worker in order to support his basic existence and reproduction. Surplus value is the remaining portion of the transformative labor value that doesn't get paid to him, but instead is stolen from the worker by the capitalist. It is the unpaid portion of the laborer's value input into the product that the capitalist keeps for himself as profit.
@@someotherandomman If profit is an act of theft, wouldn't the selling of one's own services to an employer serve as a form of theft?
@@thes6550 No
heya do you have a video on the Panama papers ?
"capitalism will fail and collapse any moment" - socialist after socialism failed
Gaslighting bs
@@utvm6748 im from post communist country myself
I talk to people that lived thru communism
Most of them are glad communism is gone
@@petrsukenik9266 [citation needed]
@@chrisgaming9567 for what exactly?
@@petrsukenik9266 "socialism failed", "im from post communist country myself", "Most of them are glad communism is gone"
Has communisim worked though ?
yes
It worked the way it intended. By making poor people even poorer and by making the elites super powerful in the name of communism.
Paul Cockshott is an amazing resource for topics like this
Would it be possible to put the "Marxism 101" videos in a playlist? This vid was mentioned to be part of a series and I would like to watch them all
Has there ever been anywhere, a single industry which has collapsed due to this vague Falling Rate of Profit theory?
We'll make it comrades!
It can go towards this...or, capitalism can divide the continents. Let me explain. S. America, Africa and Asia function as low payed uneducated workers. They "allow" big capitalists to extract surplus value from them in large quantities. They wont rebel becouse they need food to eat or simply dont know how. Meanwhile, in Europe, N. America and Australia, we feast on their fruits of labour, throwing away what ramains for them to scavange upon it. The 3 "pretty" continents function as a way to prove that capitalism works, while those continents fail bcs...well if u ask a capitalist why he will either be racist or say that it's colonialism fault, not understanding his contradiftions.
My point is that capitalism reached this point before. "Thankfully" it was in its colonialism period so it ramained. In 1950s when colonialism was falling, a new era began, the one where technology and societies of Australia Europe and N America may live in heaven as long as the other 3 live in hell. Why is this a new era? Because now, the grand 3 can never really help or let the minor 3 progess. We live in time of such censorship that the only time when we look at africa for the real state of it is when they show us how the UN is feesing them. We live in an ilusion thinking that capitalism is what brought us progress, while what it actually was are the minor 3. The worker continents.
That's why Mao Zedong believed that the revolutions are more likely to be successful in the poorer countries as they have the incentive to overthrow the capitalist. All they need is the guidance of the vanguard parties. Once the colonies have been freed, the imperial core will have no one to exploit except their own people which will only bring about the revolutionary potential of the western world itself.
Parts of Asia and South America are pretty high too
Also, South America was due to corruption and bad decision making
is that why the soviet union collapsed and America didnt
The Soviet Union was State Capitalist. Not Socialist or Communist.
@@brooklynstevens9412 at yes the classic that wasn’t real socialism argument, keep in mind capitalism won the Cold War
@@HABACHI617 It wasn't. It was State Capitalism. Socialism is the workers universally owning the means of production. This is more humane than capitalism. The means of production don't need to be privately owned.
@@brooklynstevens9412 it's called state socialism but whatever.
And nope.
Yugoslavia was bot not ussr
What happens when the American Empire inevitably falls, or when global capitalism inevitably disintegrates? Surely you don't think any status quo is immortal? Is your whole sociopolitical worldview predicated on nothing more than exploitation continuing to carry the day? That's a nakedly unscientific take on issues which I very much doubt you've considered
This dude is the epitome of cognitive dissonance. 😂
Extrapolate
Explain?
Based hakim!
I didn't really understand the crux of the matter, why does surplus value go down when you reduce variable capital, aside from the people not having the money to buy your products anymore?
no you understood it right. And if there is no one to exploit there is no surplus value so the capitalists lose the reason to produce on a capitalist basis. But they are still billionaires thats what i dont understand there then.
@@manuellanthaler2001 They own land and recourses. Were all being mined for more wealth. We are their cattle. We are being bred for s l a v e r y.
What did Communists use before candles?
Lightbulbs lol
Yeah, totally not like the USSR invented space travel, artificial hearts, nuclear energy...
@@chrisgaming9567 They invented space travel? Lmao, what crack are you smoking?
America invented the rocket, and Germany was the first to reach space with it.
Russia can’t even maintain a nuclear submarine without them exploding and begging the UK for help.
@John Doe It's more directed at anyone who's on-the-fence reading through these comments
Gring0, please, come Cuba. We'll love to receive you.
My wish came true!!
Hakim is just so absurdly and wonderfully giggly on The Deprogram. It was kinda getting on my nerves a lil, tbh, but as I watch *this* video with it's ultra dry narration, I find myself really missing the life that is so prevalent in The Deprogram version of Hakim. Maybe there really is a goldilocks zone for that kind of thing, and I'm sure its location varies for each member of the audience. Just saying.... put some pizazz into it Hakim, but don't go off the wall giggling incessantly at Yugopnik's antics either! Or maybe I'm just a nitpicking loser who should stfu and enjoy the great leftist content. I guess I'm just a dipshit enlightened centrist, but it does seem like there is a safe middle ground, and the tone of this vid seemed like it was at the far end of the yawn spectrum. Informative, none the less! And that's what counts.